pace yourself!

i think i may have figured something out ...

but first, happy father's day - to all the dads out there, enjoy your 'special' day - which means that you'll be barbeque-ing with a new necktie on, perhaps. [i make my own cake last night].

of late, i've written about getting back into the swing of things, post-cancer diagnosis. and here we are, moving along, adjusting (re-adjusting) to a normal routine. and of course, this is the busy season - in addition to quotidien aspects of life, we have baseball, graduation, concerts, pool parties, and the like - a schedule chock full of excitement.

jane is definitely doing great, but has those moments, and they're starting to reinforce my own preoccupation with aging, goals, and where we're going. and in a sense, we kind of feel like babies - are we prepared for the future? can one ever be prepared for the future (as seen through the lens of what has happened since november?).

so this is what i've figured out. i think, although i'm not sure, that WE think that we need to have it all figured out and wrapped up in a neat little box by say, 2010. that by the time our kids start heading off to start their own lives - college, jobs - we have to be 100% organized ... work, financial, house, retirement, parents, friends. perhaps it is because my own parents celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary yesterday, and that begs the question (happy golden anniversary to my mother and father!).

oh yes, here it is. 60 - that's the age i think about, not 50 (looming). and in fact, 60 is a long way off, and it dawns on me that we HAVE time, provided we can survive the roadblocks of life (fingers crossed, prayers said!). and if we somehow muddle through, we have a lot of good, productive years to 'hone' our lives - become more involved in causes, to learn more skills, produce more art, see more patients, and be their for our children. it's difficult to characterize, but i believe that with jane's breast cancer diagnosis, it seems that life is finite (yes, we know it is). but more concretely finite - in other words, we need to be 'done' soon to ensure that if anything happens to either one of us, the kids have absorbed all of our wisdom, they have a direction, we've left a legacy both personally and professionally, and we've amassed all that we need to ensure that they'll be okay.

and now, as true 'recovery' continues, we stretch this elastic truth and give ourselves a bit of slack, flexibility. we DO need to keep our eyes on the prize, but we can also meander, enjoy, relish. with a bit of hope and luck, we're not going anywhere fast, and we can exhale a bit and appreciate the ride.