A Wrinkle In Time

Have you read it? Did you love it? Author Madeleine L’Engle wrote this engrossing novel, winning the Newbury in 1963. This travel through time and space is a delight and one I intend to return to again…and soon. Reaching deep with themes of death, social conformity, and truth, this children’s chapter book can be a whole new adventure read as an adult. Here’s an interesting take on this read from adults in a Mashable podcast.

 

A Wrinkle In Time is the first in the Time Quintet series. Right now, it’s resurgence is notable in relation to the release of the movie in February 2018. Every where I turn I see this classic and what a wonderful thing that is! But what does this have to do with cancer and melanoma?

Scans and Tessering

Well, here goes my thoughts on this and cancer patients and caregivers might be most able to relate to this. Time goes fast, time goes slow for all of us. I am learning to live in the moment, the here and now but what happens when you have a full day of appointments, appointments that will give you more time to enjoy life, or bring you to that place of worry when not “passing” the scans? Let me know how you deal with scan days.

My caregiver works with me as I submit to the surrealism of MRI, CT, any various dyes, drugs, and blood letting. Liquid hope is funneled into veins like water through a hose. Like A Wrinkle in Time, there is a sci-fi quality about my Dana Farber day,  lying in tubes hearing thumps or being directed to breathe and not breathe by mechanical audio direction. Big Brother, is that you? Meditation helps to keep me in balance and mindfulness reminds me that this singular moment of pain and discomfort will pass, too.

Each of us has our wrinkle in time, a place between reality and the unknown. Sensations of time and place muddle. Questions of belief and hope are only human, and that’s just fine, to feel human. Characters in the book find their time spent with tesseracts; this time travel is often physically painful and leaves them with anxiety, uncertainty. Sound familiar?

Parallel Universe?

Parallels between A Wrinkle in Time and our own cancer journeys are uncanny. Reality is a fine place though some days we feel as though we are in a time warp, part of a science fiction writing that brings us places we never thought we’d go. Balance tips  as our health tessering brings concerns to the forefront, our future looms closer. Living in the moment skyrockets out of reach as medical melee hurls us toward the future.

Madeleine L’Engle  states that “For me, this book activates both transparency and resistance. It urges us to open ourselves up to those hurts, those tribulations, those disappointments, those doubts, those uncertainties. All of which can be summarized as darkness. It walks us through that pain to a light within ourselves, sparking us to resist all that is not for our good and fight for a better way. Simply put, A Wrinkle in Time offers a glimpse of eternity”.

Not sure where I am with the idea of eternity, but I totally look for the light in each moment, and not the sun light! Find that light within yourselves and fight the cancer battle with courage. Not the journey we chose, but how lucky to still be on the trip! #melanomatheskin #cancer #awrinkleintime #melanoma #Thursdaythoughts

We Can-cer vive!

Janis