My father died of cancer. He died a few decades ago, when he was in his early seventies. That's kind of an awkward age at which to die. You can't really say, "He died young," but you also can't say, "He lived a long life." Aside from the cancer, he spent most of his life healthy, strong, and active. He lived about ten and a half years after his cancer was first diagnosed. From the time he was diagnosed until the time he died, he had the full range of cancer treatments used at that time, including surgeries, months of radiation treatment, and years of chemotherapy.
The first step in his treatment was months of radiation therapy. He did some research prior to beginning treatment, and found that his best chance -- the place most likely to be able to cure his particular cancer -- was at a major university hospital, hundreds of miles away, in a region where the weather stays pleasant most of the year. So he arranged for his treatment, hopped on a plane, and lived in a motel for a few months. The actual treatments and medical appointments did not take up much of his time. While not busy being treated, he went sightseeing, took long walks, read books, and attended some university classes. At this completion of his initial series of radiation treatments, he returned home to a midwestern winter, tanned, toned, and energetic. He would joke about the fact that after his return, people who had heard about his cancer would say, "You LOOK good!" -- always with the emphasis on the word "look", since they believed that he was in fact dying.
I have already admitted that he DID die, following a full range of treatments over more than a decade. There are different ways to look at those ten and a half years. Certainly, the cloud of cancer was always there -- although there was always SOME hope of a sort of "cure", or at least a few more good years. Eventually, some of the treatments, and some of the progress of the disease, left him with some permanent discomforts and disabilities, such as the possibility that he might need to get to a bathroom in a hurry, and might not make it in time.
Truth is complicated. Another way to look at those ten and a half years is to say he lived them ... well, I like to say he lived them like a beer commercial. Aware of his own mortality, and of the ticking clock, he lived life to the fullest. About a year after his initial diagnosis, he built -- with his own hands, and the help of a more experienced friend -- a cabin in the country. Three years after his diagnosis he took his first trip all the way around the world. I say "first" because seven years after his diagnosis he took his SECOND round-the-world trip (in the opposite direction; we used to say it was to get back in sync with where he was supposed to be). He had always been a traveler, but the travels got more adventurous and exotic. In fact, shortly before his death he had to cancel an African safari, in order to have surgery on a newly-discovered tumor.
There is a downside even to living life to the fullest. On some occasions, he became less patient ... the clock was ticking. He sometimes had less tolerance, deciding, for instance, that if he had never enjoyed eating some particular food, he would no longer eat it, and instead eat the food that he enjoyed. This is not to say he became selfish and self-centered. If anything, he became more compassionate, and encouraged others to also live life to the fullest -- though I should acknowledge that these are MY words, not his; he wasn't one to regularly use phrases like "live life to the fullest".
Though I was busy living my own life, I was privileged to be involved in many of the travels, and, like all his loved ones, shared and helped with the various experiences. A few months before he died, Halley's Comet made one of its regular visits to our neck of the solar system. It was my father's first and last opportunity to view the famous comet, but at that time it was almost invisible to the naked eye. I set up my small telescope out in our icy driveway (it was January), and my weakened father made his way out to it, assisted by a cane hand-carved long ago by his father. He grumbled all the way to the telescope -- that was sometimes his way -- but he viewed the comet, and thanked me for ... well, I'm not sure whether he said, "Making me look at it," but he MIGHT have.
A few weeks later, we were amazed to learn that aggressive chemotherapy had succeeded in obliterating a tumor that had previously been called "incurable". A few weeks after THAT, a CT scan was done to confirm that the tumor had totally disappeared. THAT tumor had indeed vanished, but the scan revealed new tumors. He lived a month or two after that.
My father died too young. But the same cancer that ultimately ended his life also contributed to his life in positive ways. I cannot quite bring myself to say, "The cancer was a good thing." I will never know what might have become of his (and my) life without the cancer. Everyone dies. My father lived a good life. I miss my father.
Truth is complicated.
