September 11, 2001 - the day the Twin Towers fell. November 22, 1963 - the day Kennedy was assassinated. December 7, 1941 - the day Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Japanese. All incredibly important days in history, but to me there is no day I would like to forget more than January 3, 2004 - the day my mother was diagnosed with cancer.
Going back to school with the goal of improving your life is one thing, but also doing it for your cancer stricken mother is another. I had tried to go back to school once before, and fell right back in to that trap at University of Louisville. I now know where I am heading, and whom else I am working for in the forefront of my mind. I know that more profitable jobs will come after graduation, and that I will be able to more beneficially help the kids I enjoy working with. I also know I will improve my life beyond my wildest dreams.
It was at the end of my Christmas vacation, I was thinking about going back to work. How many kids will be there? Will I possibly get to leave early during the first couple of days? Then the phone rang, it was my father. I knew he had taken my mother to the doctor because she had been sick the last few days and could not shake the awful pain in her stomach. He explained to me that he and my sister were on their way to the hospital because her doctor thought she had appendicitis or a gall bladder infection. I explained I would be there as soon as I could. We were there for what felt like days, when the doctor came in and said, “It looks like there is a mass in her stomach and we are going to have to operate.”
Hours later after the surgery the doctor came out and informed us that my mother has stage 3 Ovarian cancer. I couldn’t believe it. All that was going through my mind was “That this guy’s a quack.” She was just given a clean bill of health from the same cancer not more than a year ago. There is no way, twenty-eight years later, that this can happen again. She made it through her first chemo treatment ok. It was the second and third ones that gave her trouble. The third one put her in the hospital from the end of March to now. Each treatment seemed to make her progressively weaker.
It was back in June when I started thinking how I had not finished school yet, and how I promised her she would see me graduate. So I went to Sullivan’s website one night after work, and I got information about getting back to school. The next day I had an appointment with my advisor to get enrolled in classes at Sullivan.
It would have been easy when I got the news that day for me to scrap my plans and say “to hell with it,” but then I would know how disappointed my mother would have been with me, if I had not done better than her. When it all comes down to it, that is all any parent wants for their child, is to say “Hey, my son/daughter has done better than I did.” The day I showed up in the ICU and told my mom what I had done had brought a smile to her face that was sweeter than any smile I got from any one in my life. It was almost as if she was about to jump out of her bed and hugged me. The smile was immediately met with tears. I almost lost it myself. I couldn’t help it. The emotions were a bit much for me.
After all the congratulations were done she wanted to know what classes I was taking and where I was heading as far as a major. I explained to her that I was going to get my harder subjects over first. She laughed and said, “Ahhhh you are taking English first aren’t you?” I laughed and said, “ YES!!” I went on to explain that I was also taking Math, Accounting, and Computer Information Processing.
A few days went by and things were getting really tough for her. She had recently fallen and was talking about giving up on her rehabilitation. I could not believe what I was hearing. This same woman who had beaten this same cancer once before was talking about giving up. I did not know what to say. I mean, really, what could I say? “I know what you’re going through,” it just did not seem like the right thing to say. I have never had cancer, and the first time she had cancer I was in her womb right next to the cancer. So I came up with the next best thing I could. In all my life I have never gotten straight A’s on any report card. So I promised her, as long as she fights, I will fight to get straight A’s in my classes. She smiled and said she was going to hold me to it. I couldn’t help but laugh and say “I will too.”
Since that day she has been fighting harder then I have ever seen her. One day she even made it all the way around her nurses’ station walking with her walker. Considering she has only been out of bed a few times to move to a chair, I was quite impressed to see her walking that one hundred feet. Now we give each other status reports on each other’s days. I tell her about my homework and she tells me how well she does in her physical therapy sessions. Of course I always get the, “And where are your books young man?”, every time I walk in the door. I tell her they are right here and she either helps me or asks me to visit and then let her nap while I work on my studies.
Every time I am just getting comfortable in a job, my mom will say, “You really need to get back to school and get out of that dead end job you are working.” Even if it is a job that I love and make halfway decent money working there. The first time she did this I was working for a small Internet company called IGLou. It was paying my bills and I really loved it. I had even thought about going back to school, but I did not think I could afford school and they did not pay for me to go back either. So Mom points out three or four jobs in the paper that would pay for me to go to school and pay me well too. I explained that I was happy there and I did not want to leave. I should have listened to her. I was laid off a few months later and was out of a job.
Shortly after that my dad was able to get me on working at my current job. Working in the After Care of St. Polycarp, and substitute teaching for the P.E. teacher. I work there with the kids after school helping them with homework and generally have a good time. It has always been my passion in life to work with kids. So I have also known that I would only be driving Rolls Royces in my dreams.
When I told Mom about school and what my major was she did not understand how I was still going to be able to do the one thing I dearly love, working with kids. I told her about Junior Achievement. She was still a little fuzzy on what Junior Achievement was, but she got the idea that it would still allow me to work with kids. She also understood that it meant I could work at a company making better money while working with the kids.
I am not going to lie and say this is my first trip to the rodeo. I have been here in school twice before, both times with horrific results. The first time was at University of Louisville right, out of high school. I started hanging around with the fraternities and partied way too much and ended up with a 1.9 GPA. The second time I fell in love with the person I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with. We decided that it would make more since for her to complete school first while I worked full time, because her career paid more than mine. Little did I know how that was going to end.
This time is much different from the last. My mother seeing me graduate means more to me than anything. I know that time is no longer my friend and that I am working against a clock that stops for no one. I have my goals now. I think about them every day, and what I need to do each day to achieve them. I think about how my mother gets up each morning in her hospital bed and does her therapy, because of the deal that we made. Of course I am not oblivious to the knowledge that I am not the only one she is fighting for, but I see her keeping her end so I to must keep mine.
There is one thing I felt I would never lose in my life and that is my parents. I went through my childhood with the illusion that my parents would live forever. As I got older I found that it is no longer true, and what a true bummer it was when I heard that for the first time. I always likened my parents to the invincible super heroes. With my dad being more of the sidekick. I know that day is coming when I will be told they might not make it, but until that day comes they are always invincible in my mind.
I know there are days I would like to forget. I would like to think that the 3,000 people who died on that tragic September day in 2001 was just a horrible scene from a movie I went to last week. I am sure my grandparents would like to think that the day in December in 1941 was yet another radio theatrical like that of Orson Welles with “The War of the Worlds” in 1938. Or the day I know my parents will never forget, the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated. But we can’t forget them, nor should we. These dates are locked in our minds because these dates brought great changes to our lives. Had the events of December 7, 1941 not taken place what would the world be like. Would we be speaking German? Would some of us even be here? All important dates make us think, and reevaluate our choices and go in the direction we then feel is most important. Some, as in the aforementioned dates, have made our Country as a whole move in the direction it felt it needed to move on. As for January 3, 2004, that date has my life moving toward an improved life, a more profitable job, and a closer relationship with my mother then I ever thought possible.
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