taking refuge

I am writing from Silver Lake, New Hampshire, a place that is so lovely it almost hurts. In this aquatic setting I am liking my new streamline look and feel. I ought to be able to cut through water like Flipper now. I don't, but I feel like I do. It's like when I got a pair of PF Flyers as a kid, and really felt as though I could jump higher, by golly.

I can't find a good reason to put on a bathing suit top, given that there are no nipples, no boobs, no nothing to cover up. So I don't.

When the water is cold, I do find myself thinking, "Brrr! If I had nipples, they'd be erect fo' sho'!" The good thing, though, is that it's okay. As long as I stay healthy, right now I am okay without breasts. I do not miss bras, and I absolutely do not miss bathing suit tops.

To those passing in canoes and kayaks, I am hoping I look like a boy, a gray-haired boy with a buzz cut, reading psychotherapy texts on the dock. To add to the ambiguity, as soon as I move, I am more like an old Chinese man -- Pop, in fact. The similarities between my dad and me -- the stiff but animated gait, the gestures, the facial expressions -- are both sweet and creepy, and all are highlighted by the thin hair and neuropathy. Laura and I alternate between being charmed and spooked by it. I would like to channel Pop's charm, his vivacity -- his late-life rickety self, not so much.

A friend and blog follower recently pointed me toward a website that focuses on all the blogging done by breast cancer copers. Breast cancer blogs, it seems, are a dime a dozen. No -- less! They're free, and they're everywhere. My little musings feel quite ordinary, honestly, which is probably a good and important thing. I had truly begun to think about birthing a book, but now I doubt that a viable book could come out of this. I'm going to play with it seriously, but not solemnly, and with few illusions.

I'm even of two minds about the cancer experience as an extraordinary thing. People have told me, "Now you just need to live your life. We're all going to die, and who knows? I might get hit by a car tomorrow."

Okay, that's true, I think. I then decide just to chew on and gracefully digest my personal serving of existential comeuppance. I can sustain that perspective for awhile, and then it dawns on me that for people who've gotten cancer, the feeling is actually more like "Heads up. Cars are a little bit drawn to you." Then it is harder to digest.

I do like those moments when I have a more Zen approach to the whole thing, when I think, "I'm here now, and that is all that matters." Shit happens, but it plops into an immense container of Good. That's kind of Zen, right?

I am an odd zen/neurotic hybrid, as most of us are. This morning while meditating on the dock (the underwear on my head, dunked in the lake, kept me cool), I thought of a title for a book I'd like to write, if I ever do find the wit and the wherewithal. Titles come and go in my little mind, but this one speaks to me: "I Take Refuge in Buddha, but Buddha has a Heck of a Time Finding a Way to Take Refuge in Me."