I *Heart* Boobies...

So...it is Breast Cancer Awareness month.

And I feel very passionate about cancer in general, but especially Breast cancer.

Several people I know have been touched by this...sad illness. So this is my tribute :)

This poem has an unknown author, but it is beautiful...

Cancer is so limited...

It cannot cripple love.

It cannot shatter hope.

It cannot corrode faith.
It cannot eat away peace.
It cannot destroy confidence.
It cannot kill friendship.
It cannot shut out memories.
It cannot silence courage.
It cannot reduce eternal life.
It cannot quench the Spirit.

I have many lives around me that have been touched by cancer; both family, friends, and some friends who have become family...my next door neighbor, women I have known my whole life, both of my grandmothers, my beautiful, precious cousin who after fighting for a little over a year, going back and forth to Stanford, who towards the end, had to have her IV's in her beautiful smooth head because they could no longer find a vein in her anywhere else, lost her heroic fight with Leukemia when she was only 9 years old.

And as different as these sandals are below, are the lives of those this cancer touches, and the lives it affects, each and every day.

My great-aunt passed away this past spring, only a few months ago really...and I went to her service down by Fresno, after a two year long bout with cancer. My aunt Irma did not look the vibrant, lively, beautiful and sweet woman that I remembered when I was younger. She had the biggest heart, would help anyone she could, and loved while she helped you. They told her two years ago that she only had 6 months to live...and my response to that was that only the Lord knows when He is ready for us to go home to Him.

She is home now with the Lord, but her husband, my uncle John, has NEVER been without his Irma...and had a rough transition...and now we have discovered he has cancer himself...this life is never easy...especially for those who face this unseen demon...who fear they are just buying time...but we must remember that those who lose this battle don't do it unwillingly...sometimes, maybe most times, they have more will than those of us who are healthy, and living "normal" lives every day...but they have incredible stories to tell, full of life, of love, of tears, of pain, and beauty, and ugliness on the rough days where it may be all they can do to keep down some broth and have no strength left to speak, or even sleep...their stories are incredible, and can teach us so much.

My grandma very recently discovered she had breast cancer; within the past 6 months. And I could not be with her, to take her to doctor's appointments, to help her on the days when she was having it rough...she lives in Idaho, and I could not be there, but she went through surgery, and then radiation. And I am so proud to be her granddaughter...this is not even her first bout with cancer, but her third. She is amazing to me, and she is such a survivor.

To sit and realize that the story of your life, is "all of a sudden" out of your control, and sudden, you're spiraling out of control when you get the news, everything seems to come crashing down around you...or maybe everything becomes silent and utterly still...or maybe all the sounds around you, where ever you might be or be going, seem to get deafening...maybe your hands and feet, or your whole body turn to mush, and you can't seem to stand or do anything, just frozen...

Whatever your story, its an amazing one...I love hearing stories...I consider it one of my best abilities and one of my greatest pleasures in life...to be able to sit, listen, and feel someone's story...to live it with them in some small way; whatever it may consist of.

Stories are what connect us; and survivors have unique stories, stories that link them together, that unify them, if they are not in any other way. And cancer survivors are unique in the fact that they have overcome something that is at times, considered "bigger" than they are...but their stories are so rich, and full of life, that death is no longer main focus. It merely becomes a doorway, into a new life, a healthy life, that is everlasting...So I encourage stories, and support, of those enduring the fight, and those who have survived it...How awesome and courageous you are!

The amazing thing is that all who have dealt with cancer have the ability to say The Victory Is Won...they just say it differently, but they all say it courageously, valiantly, and whole-heartedly...and that is how they rise above. One way or another, they rise:

Above the Cancer, above the sorrow, and above the pain, some never have to endure another Chemo treatments, or any more Radiation burns and scars, no more nausea, fatigue, side effects from Chemo and Radiation; and others, who are declared, CANCER-FREE...well, they are the survivors, who rise up, higher than ever before, on wings like eagles, to places they never thought they would ever see...or ever see again...and that is what is so awesome about survivors...