Chances are good

Striding onto the gym floor this morning-- the only way I can stay fired up-- a too too thin man in a white tee shirt and navy pants, half-smiled at me. I kept going; who is this? When I looked back from my rowing machine, I saw it was someone I know. His wife I had heard, has serious colon cancer, and so I left my station to talk to him, add my concern, offer some support. 'Well, she's better now that pre-op chemo and radiation are done. All of us will probably get cancer, you know, and at least she's very fit. Still, chemo and radiation really did a job on her.' Despite it being a Friday, I worked out hard today, partly because this story stuck, partly because someone our family is very close to, a 34 year-old young woman is struggling with brain cancer. It felt right to get into the pool for laps, where I could suspend myself away from reality, get into a womb state. But in the shower I cried. When I got home, I felt compelled to check out my gym friend's gloomy pronouncement. looked up the odds of getting cancer in one's lifetime. According to the American Cancer Association, based on 2009 statistics, the odds of developing or dying from cancer of any kind are one in two for men (44.81%) one in three for women (%38.1). Those are high odds. No one really talks about this. Instead, we choose to focus on the odds for particular cancers where the odds are much, much, lower. Like 1 in 182 are the odds for women developing brain cancer, 1 in 21 for colon cancer. My mother had colon cancer, and outlived it. Everyone without cancer thinks they can escape it, or beat it, and people who've had cancer would prefer not to talk about it. What can anybody do, beside give up smoking, stay active, and get cancer screens? Genes figure big. When I moved onto the gym area this morning, I think I knew who smiled at me. But facing him meant facing cancer, and I needed a a couple of seconds. I'm still in great denial about the real possibility that I'll get cancer, or Rob will, or someone I'm really close to. But why focus on it now? It feels entirely inadequate and embarrassingly out of scale, but I'm going to send encouragement cards today. One of them, all sparkling and silver is about the beauty of a snowflake, and inside it reads, 'if only time could stand still.' For these two women, I'm sure they would agree.