This Is Us

When we came down to be with Angela in late July, we booked our flights for our next visit to coincide with her 9th round of chemotherapy. That treatment was originally scheduled for this week but was delayed because of her COVID infection and blood clot.

Katie and I discussed changing our trip to time with another chemo round, instead of coming this week, which ended up being an “off” week. But, what if we rescheduled and they wouldn’t even let us into the cancer center to be with her? The point of coming down was to spend time with her and if we could potentially be “locked out” that wasn’t a chance we were willing to take. 

So off we went….Katie from outside of Denver…and me from north of Chicago to be with our friend of 40+ years during the fight of her life.

We feel helpless. We live thousands of miles away. On a day-to-day basis, we can’t drive her to appointments or hold her hair while she vomits (which thankfully hasn’t happened yet). We can’t help her declutter her house or get home projects done which is stressing her out.

But the one thing we can do is to make her laugh…. and to feel alive. And that we hope we did.

We laughed about being in Mrs. Dettman’s third grade class. And about hanging with our Plat 6 posse (you know who you are). We talked about Andy having to turn his irreverent T-shirt inside out to enter Cuba during our recent visit. We giggled about 25 cent martini’s at Commander’s Palace, sticky vinyl seats and coining the term, “Aloha,” as our inside joke greeting/catch all phrase.  We reminisced about Angela’s visits to come see us—-in Colorado, in my dorm in Gainesville, to help while Jake was sick, and for Super Jake events. And with every visit or trip there were more stories and more laughs.

We laughed about fighting over who got to work the drive through and wear the cool headset when we all worked at McDonald’s. Or who had to wait on the “no tippers” when we all waited tables at Perkins.

We talked out the love and hardships of parenting…. and about our own crazy parents (you too know who you are :-)) But most of all, we just were together. And sometimes, that’s all any of us needs. 

After 40 years, we have so much history, so many adventures, so many laughs, and  thankfully, not as many tears. We even have a physical altercation to reminisce about [Angela won, in case you didn’t guess :-)] 

As we head back to our parts of the country, our thoughts and thanks go out to Angela’s family, friends and coworkers who are physically supporting and surrounding her every day through this journey. We wish we could do more and we thank you for all you are doing. You are awesome and amazing and she needs each and every one of you. She may not be able to respond, but she reads and appreciates every call…every text…every card or gift…every FaceTime call…every post and comment. 

Love,

Her Sisters from Other Misters

Katie and Ann