hypotheses, inevitably

Was it that mimeograph ink I inhaled so deeply as a kid? Woof, I loved that smell. I was so happy when the teacher hadn't had time to copy stuff ahead of time, and dashed out of the classroom for a moment, returning with pages of purple ink still drying. I held the whole pile of math sheets to my nose and filled my lungs (and brain cells, I guess) with their fumes before taking one and passing it back. Did that give me cancer?

Was it MSG? I imagine in my time I've had more than I should.

Or the fact that I popped dozens of nickels, dimes, and quarters out of Lee's coin collection books and bought Beatles and Herman's Hermits records with the booty. Not just that I did it, but that I felt so guilty for so long.

What about Fizzies? Fizzies couldn't have been a good idea. A few times I sucked on them before dropping them in water. Some of them contained that red dye # whatever it was. Cheetos. There's not a natural ingredient in those. Munchos. Jelly beans. Necco Wafers. Jujubees. Sugar feeds tumors, right? I used to take loose change from my dad's pockets and ride my bike down to the corner store to buy candy. That's guilt AND sugar.

When I was maybe 4, I ate the H and the A, and maybe even the P, off a set of those chalky sugar "Happy Birthday" letters you put on cakes. A Kresge's saleswoman caught me. Boy, was I embarrassed. She told mom, who didn't need to scold me, I felt so ashamed. Shame is toxic, right?

Maybe that awful first sexual experience damaged me, made the cancer happen where it did. Maybe I couldn't let go of my resentment toward him, or toward myself for letting it happen. Maybe I held that shaming experience in my breasts.

Maybe I've been too passive all along. Haven't stood up for myself, and that translated to not being vigilant enough on a cellular level. There are too many examples to name that feed that hypothesis.

They say an angry personality invites disease. But maybe I'm not angry enough! Maybe, since I don't feel angry, I'm repressing it, and that made me sick. Maybe I should work myself up to being angry about something, then expressing it somehow.

Or the divorce -- carrying all that guilt -- there's guilt again. And the grief I held when the kids weren't with us -- that was the worst. It was so hard, how I missed them. Was that grief changing my cells?

I don't think it's my parents dying in rapid succession last year. Though some cancer books ask "what has happened in the past year or two?", the doctors all seem to think my 1.2 cm tumor had been growing for several years. And heck, Ellen's grief and breasts are the same as mine was and were.

Several years ago I wasn't exercising enough. Just sitting around having counseling sessions, coming home to cook supper, grade student papers, watch over the kids' homework. I should have sweated more.

Maybe it's that I've held the cell phone too close to my head. Or that I've stood too close to the microwave. Or spent too much time on the computer. Maybe I am too vigilant about getting rid of poison ivy in our woods and shouldn't use that spray.

On the other hand, I only drink soda like once a year, at some picnic where that's all that's left. When we were little, though, Lee and Kevie would make us root beer floats when the folks went out. They'd serve them over the kitchen's half-door, like Ellen and I were customers and they were working at an ice cream shop. I sure did love those moments and those floats. I know those floats didn't get me sick; maybe moments like that kept me from getting cancer earlier.

A girl-beer or a margarita is about all I drink, and those only rarely. The alcohol I choose generally has to taste like lemonade gone bad, but in an okay way. I stop after one, and usually think, "What the heck did I just drink that for? Now I don't want to do anything." I would think that level of moderation might pay off, though, in not getting cancer.

But maybe I should be drinking more red wine? I've read those reports about red wine. I'd have to use my inhaler, since most alcohol - even girl-beer - makes me wheeze. Still, I'll take an inhaler over cancer. That's an easy one.

They say people are more susceptible to cancer if they don't get enough sleep. My sleep has been gefromped since menopause. Did a lack of delta waves set off other waves that set off a ripple of cancer cells?

Do I not laugh enough, failing to clear out toxins? Should I be more social? Volunteer more? Serve the community...I stink at that, at outreach, at group things. Maybe not doing enough volunteer work gave me cancer. Maybe I should go to Quaker meeting more often; just sit, breathe, and be with the power of Grace and Goodness and Mystery. Breathe in love; breathe out cancer.

I have lots of hypotheses. I doubt any of them have any validity at all, yet they just keep coming.

But random? That this was random?  That my little meaning-making machine of a mind cannot take in.