The Silent Meeting of Souls

Lately I have spent a lot of time feeling grateful for the people in my life.  So many encouraged me when I decided to take a leap of faith and pursue a new career.  I am going into the non-profit sector professionally, a natural progression of my lifelong belief that we all need to earn our place at the table.  Still lots of people probably think I am crazy.

Candidly, I'm not one of those selfless, living saints who makes the rest of us feel ashamed for being so shallow.  Admittedly I can be charming, but if you know me long enough you will certainly realize I am as flawed as the next person.  When I do manage to objectively evaluate myself, it is clear that my passion and talents will be useful to the non-profit sector.

I am well versed in volunteerism and voluntaryism and recognized long ago that I am very persuasive when my heart is in it.  The formula is simple.  When I selflessly access my own genuine humanity in the process I connect with that same aspect in others.   I was warned in my youth to stop being so emotional, compassionate, tolerant, generous, understanding and kind.  My parents felt being too empathetic would set me up to be taken advantage of by con artists or worse.

It was all true, of course.  After several years of helping to support a family of ten living in the public projects I never taught them how to fish.  I gave up for a while and tried to suppress my good-girl, here-take-mine, very impulsive personality traits.  I eventually succumbed to the practice of merely harnessing these feelings, but this made me unhappy. I felt self-centered more often than I cared to admit.

Thankfully, through the wisdom of many before me, I eventually realized that these were my most valuable human qualities.  Rather than suppress them, I learned to cultivate and nurture them in myself and others.  It amazed me how much suffering could be alleviated with a few willing hands, experienced professionals and open pocketbooks.

Life is full of opportunities for greatness whether we end up on the cover of People Magazine or only in the heart of another person.  There is no time table for good deeds, of course, and we don't have to put a limit or create minimums for our efforts. So much is needed, even small sacrifices obtain a certain magnificence.

Knowing I will die someday, without loud complaints I can say that I have had the greatest life.  Ultimately, none of the things that matter had anything to do with accumulating wealth, fame or glory.  Not that I didn't enjoy my 7.5 minutes of fame and a European vacation, but those things are not what ends up being meaningful.

Human achievement is a wonderful thing, of course.  There are brilliant people  inventing newer and better ways to preserve life, but there are many more of us who modestly find ways to give back.  Each grain of sand will always matter to the beach.  It's irrelevant where our inspiration takes us either.  The God I believe in has never spoken to me directly, but if I can weep watching a schmaltzy television commercial or change my life's direction because of a chance encounter with my human companions, I can no longer doubt there is a higher purpose than merely answering hedonism's call.

In early 2001 I was starting  radiation and chemotherapy sessions.  Feeling traumatized by the new port (surgical opening) in my upper arm threaded with a tube to drop poisons into my chest cavity, I felt like a wild animal looking for an escape route.  Every movement outside myself seemed highlighted in neon and even minor sounds seemed to reverberate through me.  I heard engine motors grind, tires screech, footsteps on carpet... it was an endless assault on all my senses.

Waiting for my first appointment, I watched intently as people walked by.  They were laughing, talking, bumping into each other and some even seemed to argue.  I am sure not one of them noticed the redhead sitting alone by the window in the corner.  I was busy wrestling with a horrendous diagnosis, terrified I might not have a future and avoiding the searching eyes of the other people in the room.

I was afraid to trust anything, afraid I would upset others and very afraid to allow myself to experience my feelings.  It felt weak to cry or feel sorry for myself,  so although those closest to me tried to be reassuring, I was angry I had to rely on anyone. An arrogance that would not survive my treatment choked on the indignity of needing other people and the loss of my self-sufficiency.

"You'll make it."  "You're a fighter."  "Keep a positive attitude."  "At least you've got insurance!"  "You're lucky you work for yourself.  You can take off all the time you need."

They were enormously well-meaning, but I was the first of our friends to have a near-death experience.  Nobody was skilled at the sort of listening and support I needed.  Friends had odd reactions.  Some wanted all the gory details and others, even a beloved sister, avoided me as if I were contagious.  I wondered how anyone could innocently carry on as if life were free, procrastinating, joking or sleeping until noon.  Life had become finite for me.  I was waiting to learn what my personal 'best if used by' date might be.  I felt sad that parts of me would be soon grilled, marinated, surgically moved and, yes, dead.   My flesh losing that pinkish look I now associate with the skinless chicken parts at my favorite butcher shop.  I had taken so much for granted.

I knew if I wanted a chance to live I had to obey other people.  Just sit quietly until they call you, I told myself.  Don't wince when the nurse pushes that IV into your hand.  Willingly strip and expose your entire lower half to the nightmare of radiation and trust that these ghouls are really people trying to save you.

No one used reassuring words like, ''piece of cake" or 'the treatment is the cure'.  They would not even talk about percentages of survival, focusing instead on reminding me that I was 'lucky'.  For my kind of cancer there was a treatment.  Its efficacy under those conditions hardly mattered.

My caretakers looked as somber and serious as I felt on the inside.  I wondered how they could be so present for me.  Tears slid down my cheeks with thoughts of unborn grandchildren I might never meet.  As they asked if I needed the names of someone I could talk to I said "No thank you".  My automatic rejection was based on my assumption that my insurance would not cover the cost.  I later learned these social services were free to cancer center patients, too late in my treatment to matter.  And yet these nurses, and doctors and technicians were there.  They were angels of mercy whom I regarded as suspiciously as an old pound dog would the helpful caretaker who opens the cage door without a food dish in evidence.

On that first day a small boy and slightly older girl arrived in a taxi, entered the radiation waiting room and sat down across from me.

The older one whispered in Spanish, which I understand, but the younger child had not mastered her quiet technique.  While she tried to calm her 'hermanito', an endearment meaning 'little brother', he wailed as he pleaded loudly with her to take him home.  He pulled on her sleeve beseechingly and told her, misty-eyed,  that he didn't want any more radiation.  Then he gestured as if he were praying and said that his chest port hurt, so could she please check it again.

She looked at him calmly then unbuttoned the top three buttons of his shirt.  She pulled it open and stared intently at the five-inch-square white bandage covering his breastbone, her face mere inches away.

"It looks fine.  Pretty soon the doctors will take it out," she said, "but you have to be brave a little longer."

Then she buttoned his shirt back up and used the sleeve of her blouse to wipe the tears from his face before putting her arm around his shoulders.  He rolled himself into her like an infant, the two seemingly frozen in this unnatural pose.

He's lucky he has a sister and not a brother, I mused, but children shouldn't be here all alone.

Suddenly I was furiously angry, unsure at whom. Eventually I settled on nature, prompted by the nagging certainty that it was unsafe at that point in my treatment to dare to blame God.  As each minute dragged on, I felt guiltier at my lack of faith and helplessness.  Distracted from my own self-centeredness, I continued to witness the intimacy that passed between the innocent siblings.  My maternal impulses eventually   compelled me to try to distract them.

"Tengo un poco de miedo tambien," I began.   Telling them that I was a little scared too seemed to be appropriate.

"We should be proud of ourselves for being so brave, don't you think," I asked and genuinely smiled for the first time in perhaps weeks.

At this the little six-year-old grinned.  His sister, recognizing my accent, promptly replied in English, "Oh, yes!  He's truly the bravest boy in the whole world!"

Then she translated for him what she had said to me.  He smiled with childish pride, his eyes sparkling.

Later I learned from my oncologist that this boy had been receiving radiation treatments for Hodgkins disease, a type of cancer, for almost a full year.  His parents were too poor to miss work, so the hospital's foundation had donated funds.  The children were picked up by taxi and driven to the center five days a week after school.  The nine-year-old sister waited with him while he received his treatment and then the taxi brought them home again.  The radiologist, the oncologist, the foundation and the cancer center all donated their services, treatments and medications.

The boys' parents had been given legal permission to immigrate to the United States  after their child was diagnosed in their home country and sent home without adequate treatment. Their dreams of saving their son's life here in the United States were just that.  Dreams.  Without money, struggling with a language barrier and no available public services, they were in the most vulnerable segment of the working poor.

Fortunately they had distant relatives already living here who helped them with housing and some living assistance, but paying for a year's worth of medical treatment for an invasive cancer was beyond even their extended family's capacity.  With two low-paying jobs each, the parents saved their money.  They brought their child to the hospital when his symptoms worsened and he was apparently dying.

Some might say, "Not our problem.  Let them go back where they came from and good riddance," but others?  Fortunately some hearts do not recognize the artificial boundaries constructed by nations, man or disease.  These good souls are called humanitarians and I hope I will always be part of this group.

As grisly as my own treatment was to be, it is the vivid memory of this boy's enormously joyful smile that stays with me - a grin that dominated his face in the midst of adversity - and his sister's enduring compassion.  Those big, brown, soulful eyes, his four missing front teeth and the maternal impulses of the girl-child who executed her duties with the grace of Florence Nightingale.... these are the images I will never forget.

Yes, I was a 'good' patient with the excellent fortune to have gold-plated insurance.   I followed protocol and endured what I needed to endure and survived.  Yet I wonder if my will to live was enhanced because that boy gave something to me that has no name.  In our shared humanity and suffering, he lifted me higher than any pep talk, support group, church, medicine or treatment could have.  Our chance meeting and his tiny spirit and  courage helped me find mine.

At our lowest this meeting of souls is what we seek.  There is comfort in not being alone in our suffering.  Perhaps this is the element that gives us the grace to manage those challenges that often seem insurmountable.  It happens in all the holy places, of course, but there wasn't any more sacred place that day than sitting across from those little children.

The rewards deep human contact brings make the effort of living worth all the suffering.  These glorious, random encounters inspire us with their healing power.  A kind word, a donation to a worthy cause, a thoughtful telephone call to a bereaved friend or any amount of pro-active motion travel much farther than the laws of physics should allow. Of course, I hope to enter this non-profit world not with a job but as a calling.   It is more meaningful for me than just the act of giving back.

I think of all those people who made that little boy's treatment possible, most of whom would never be privileged enough to meet him.  I must also thank the people who donated to and financed the research that made my treatment possible.  It takes very  brave people - both researchers and patients -  to be willing to participate in clinical trials.  My radiologist was quite clear when she said had I developed cancer ten years before I did, my story would have been much shorter.

At this point in my life I don't want to leave the remaining work to others.  I want to make a difference now and then again tomorrow for all the others like those children, your parents, mine, you, me and the thousands of others who are still suffering and will continue to suffer indescribable agonies without our help.

These are the commodities in which I choose to invest armed with the knowledge that they will never lose value.