FIVE

21 3/4 inches of growing children

18 visits from the tooth fairy

7 honors ceremonies

2 school plays

1 preschool graduation

2 preschool Christmas programs

10 school Christmas parties

6 church choir programs

5 first days of school

5 birthdays

10 (semi) planned birthday parties

5 anniversaries

2 kindergarten graduations

6 Christmases

5 sets of Halloween costumes

5 seasons of Mississippi State football

9 little league baseball seasons

2 dance recitals

over 50 scans

over 60 weeks of treatments

180 boxes of chemo pills

one unlikely survival speech

countless vials of blood 

one magazine article

three cancers

two surgeries

one pair of worn-in cowboy boots

a few more wrinkles

a few more gray hairs

one tattoo

one amazing race

and countless prayers, tears, laughs, fears, and what-ifs later...

I woke up to 2016.  

Stephen and I stood numbly in a doctor’s office five years ago and he said, “I need you to teach me how to fix her hair.”  I have fixed hair almost every day for the last 1,846 days.  Granted, some days it has looked better than others, but so has mine.  I have also facilitated teeth brushing at least twice a day which is no small task.

Five years.

I kind of wondered what I would do if I hit the five year mark.  The answer is really nothing.  Stephen and I kicked off the Christmas season and called ourselves celebrating in Chicago a few weeks ago.  We took our first trip there together for my 33rd birthday.  Later that year, we were pretty sure we’d never be back.  In 2012, we did go back.  I walked his tail all over Michigan Avenue and up and down State Street.  He never said a word, just watched me walk and was glad I could.  As a trade off, I sat through the coldest Bears game of my life.  We’ve been every year since.  

This year’s trip was not without roadblocks as we ended up in Texas before we got to Chicago.  I sat in the airport laughing at the irony as I remembered so vividly of how five years before I somehow ended up in Texas in a cancer clinic.  The three hour delay didn’t seem so bad this time.  Five years ago, Stephen was begging everyone at the airport to find another flight to make our appointment on time because of a weather delay.  This year there was also a weather delay, a canceled flight, and we barely missed the earlier connecting flight even though we ran from the plane like we were on fire.  We stood at the counter with a businessman who had the last seat but probably would have given it up as he asked, “Do you HAVE to get there?”  Our answer was no.  No we don’t.  We don’t have to be anywhere.  No cancer clinic, no brain MRI, no first opinion, no second opinion.  We can just sit in the Texas airport for 3 hours, drink coffee, and look at the boot store.  Stephen can predict that the band members from Great White and Slaughter might possibly based on his Twitter tour schedule research and disappear to spot them a the Dunkin Donuts.  And then just for fun, I can walk over and say hi to them.  No panic, just an “oh well.”  We’re used to waiting by now.  

My actual cancerversary was spent wrapping up the school year with fifth grade social studies projects, school Christmas parties, and an excited boy and girl who look forward to a few weeks with no reading or spelling and all the joy that Christmas has to offer.  We anticipated celebrated the birth of baby Jesus who forever changed our hope.   We ate dinners with friends and talked about how what happened five years ago brought us together, made us closer, and prepared us for the changes on the road ahead.  We celebrated the life of my grandmother who decided to spend her 98th Christmas in heaven.  I’m sure my mom was glad to have her.  I also took time to blow out my candle on my Christmas Tree cake.  Stephen looked at me and said, “Today is proof that statistics don’t matter.”

This season has not been without thought of what we have experienced and what we are thankful for.  I remember walking into our church’s Santa breakfast five years ago, two days after my world changed with my little two year old and five year old.  I was going through the motions, playing Christmas.  People stared, surprised to see me - most of whom I barely knew but no one knew what to say.  I didn’t know either.  Our family went to Christmas Eve service for the first time and as I watched Kate walk up to the front in her tinsel angel halo, I wondered what the next Christmas would look like. The next year, every ornament I put on the tree caused a pinching stabbing pain from the spinal tumor I would soon discover I had.  

This year, Stephen played the guitar at the Christmas Eve Service.  He strummed, “Hark the Herald Angels Sing...” while my now seven year old walked up in her tinsel halo with the other children.  My now ten year old sat close to me and giggled at the little kids who cried and ran back and forth to their parents.  The service was loud and full of joy, just like a birthday should be.  On Christmas morning we opened boxes that our little girl wrapped - hand colored ornaments, paintings that they had done, and presents that they picked out from the church’s alternative Christmas, because they now understand the importance and joy of giving.  My boy curled up next to me and educated me on iPhones and Instagram because he knows how to love.  She sang to the top of her lungs into a pink microphone while I made pancakes on Christmas morning.  They jumped until they were sore in the freezing cold on a trampoline that they never dreamed of getting.  We screamed and yelled like real people do as we loaded up all the dogs and the kids and gifts to go have Christmas with the grandparents.  

Statistics don’t matter.  They don’t.  When it was all said and done, my chances were approximately zero making me keenly aware that every day is nothing short of a gift.  I have thought a lot about what Stephen said and determined that maybe the statistics do matter.  They have mattered to us more than we like to admit.  They have been the reference point to the miracle we experienced.  Our expectations were so low that up seemed too far to imagine.  My trajectory of forward movement is one based on what could have been.  It’s not coincidental.  God wants us to expect more.  He wants us to expect the miracle.  

There is a saying that life is not measured by the number of breaths you take, but by the number of moments that take your breath away.  Maybe so.  But, if I walk around waiting for my breath to be taken away, I might end up disappointed.  So I kind of measure the breaths, or don’t try to measure life at all.  I don't worry about if it measures up - just live it and enjoy it.  If I wake up breathing, then it’s a good thing and there’s joy to find.  Some days I find myself breathing deep to get through it or holding my breath for just a minute because that seems more appropriate.  Either way, I’m glad to be living it. 

So, here’s to a happy and new 2016.  May it be full of living, loving, breathing, and immeasurable joy.

Happy New Year!

KJ

Chicago 2015

Chicago 2010