Life, Love, and Other Mysteries

The other morning, over breakfast, my chatty seven-year-old sprang one of the big questions on me: “Who created life?” She asked over her buttered bagel.

“Well, what many people call ‘God’ created life,” I answered.

Not satisfied, she looked at me expectantly. “But who created God?”

I’m not sure it gets more Zen than staring into the bright eyes of a child whose life emerged from your own and being faced with a mystery humans have been pondering since they became self-aware.

Ah, life: so subtle and so profound. Sometimes, she becomes invisible to us, and we take her for granted. And then there are moments, like the one I had this morning, when her magic, electric force, suddenly strikes you.

Some of the moments during which I have been most aware of life have been in a hospital, amidst machines measuring heart rate and respiration. Preparing for a procedure or to have a baby— and suddenly, there she is.

Life— that ephemeral force, like a current running through this world of sights, sounds, and sensations. Observable through scientific measures but escaping explanation.

I’m preparing to publish my third book, “Angels and Accidents: Confessions of a Cancer Survivor.”

As I combed through journal entries and blog posts to create the book, I encountered decisions about how to present the story.

I considered creating a more straightforward narrative about what it’s like to get cancer as a young woman. To do this, I would edit out the dreams, visions, and philosophical meanderings and focus on the practical stuff: life interruption, a drinking attachment (so evident through my writings), what it’s like to go through treatment, and the challenge of moving on afterward.

However, I opted to keep the story whole and authentic to my experience by including notable dreams, visions, synchronicities, and cosmic commentary.

To me, these things are just as real as sitting here typing on this keyboard and watching the words appear on this bright screen.

In my world, spirituality and physicality are one.

Cancer broke me open. Life broke me open. Grief can sting beyond measure, but it also shows us how much love we are capable of.

Taking leaps, whether from one career to another or from this life to the next, are scary, but they are also part and parcel of the awe-inspiring mystery of life.

Life is change, and change is constant.

A book is a smooth, polished stepping stone in a fast-moving river.

My third one will be available soon.