Angels the Fourth

In which the Air is Thick with Angels.

Did I say earlier that my opiates produced no visions?  “The air is thick with angels,” I said to my husband and (I think) to a few visiting friends as I lay in my hospital bed.  I don’t know.  I was still pretty out of it and I bet they thought I was partially insane.  But I do distinctly remember a certain thickness in the air, as if I could pass my arm to the side of my bed and hit something unexpected.  (Think of Kershisnik image from earlier angel post). After the other angel incidents, I can honestly say that I believe it to be more than opium.  (Although I do admit that it is like opiates in that often with the angels I would close my eyes and then that’s when I could see them).  You just can’t see these things with your waking eyes, but with the spiritual. 

When I closed my physical eyes I could see or sense people I knew drawing close around me.  And not just my forebears, but Jon’s as well.  I am certain that both his Grandpa Melvin’s were there.  I know this because Jon and I had been reading through family history stories for family home evening this summer and these angelic people seemed familiar to me.  There were both men and women, and as I said, the air was THICK with angelic presence, hoping to see me regain my physical and emotional strength.  Looking back, I feel as though the very powers of heaven were clustered around me just to give me support and to watch over Jon and me in our extremity, even as we slept.  It occurs to me that this very same thing happened with my support and friends here in the Stake.  Angels, all of them.  (Also my family and friends not here in Alaska—but you are far away, so you can’t “cluster” around me en masse). 

I should mention that the angelic visits were before I had made my peace with this whole brain tumor and cancer thing.  I was not yet resolved to the Lord’s will on this.  Indeed, as yet I had little idea of how this thing was about to spiral out of control.  I assure you that I already had no grip on the situation.  But it was comforting to have them there looking out for me.  I wish I understood more what exactly my angels could do for a sick girl stuck in bed.  Do they whisper certain necessary hymns inside your ears?  Do they catch you when your physical therapist isn’t paying quite enough attention if you list to the left too quickly?  Do they get out the pom-poms and cheer?  Do they pray?  I don’t know as much as I’d like to about who these people are or what they can do.

However in all my angel experiences, I am reminded of, and will heavily paraphrase, that pioneer story from the Martin Hancock Company and the testimony of a man as he said that he would never regret being on that journey.  He declared gladness and willingness to do it all over again.  He would fix his eyes on a certain point on the road ahead and think, “If I can just pull my cart to that spot, then I will be done and can go no further—but then when he got there he felt the cart pushing him along.   Let me be clear, I am not a glutton for punishment.  I have no desire to go through my trials again.  But I know what he’s saying about the extra help. 

My Life as Shown in a Line Chart

In which our Protagonist realizes her story is badly planned.

It seems my devastatingly interesting tale is badly planned. As a result, I’ve decided to add a little tension by further postponing the conclusion to this week’s dramatic episode—so—Angels the IV tomorrow.  Besides, tomorrow is Sunday and you can read it and feel all warm and fuzzy inside on the Sabbath. 

It is true about the anti-climactic nature of my narrative. I began with a truly harrowing beginning, but by the fourth blog posting had told you the end of the story—that I would live.  So much for keeping you hanging.  Nope.  None of my readers sit on the edges of their seats.  There is no climactic sense of the dramatic as I get zapped with radiation, no mind-boggling chemotherapy, no endless and painful torture.  Such literary elements as plot, foreshadowing, and conflict are missing. I’m already married and have a child, so where’s the romantic element?  My evil archenemy, Mr. Cancer, has proven a dudd.  The whole thing is a sham, a misrepresentation!  And just to continue this evil trend of falsehood, I will hereby fib to you all by apologizing abjectly for my complete and utter failure. 

Here is a graph, showing not a mountain range, but the supposed climax of my story.  The red line looks somewhat like the graph on my Stats page showing the number of hits and thus the interest of my readership.  The red line is my actual story line.  (Not that I want the red line to get higher—that might indicate my life getting worse...) The blue is what I think I remember learning about how a book/story should be written in high school English class.  Notice the contrast.

Scoff and Scorn: Another Tangential Conversation, or the Angels will have to wait again

In which our Heroine attends Book club and for once, finds herself Mute.

It has come to my attention that some of you may be scoffing at me for the organic food idea.  I think this may be a possibility because I encounter that quizzical look people give you any time I mention it.  You know, the one that points a finger and mouths, “Crazy hippy extremist.”  Last evening I attended my book club meeting and received a full round of these looks.  At one point near the end (while innocently sampling some cake), I quietly mentioned to the ladies that I was considering going organic.  My answer?  First, a loud and full scoff from one (who for some reason already seems to think I’m an idiot), and disparaging laughter from a few of the others.  At most, I usually receive only half-scoffs and a slight-turn-the-head-away as if I can no longer be looked at full-on.  The full scoff accompanied by intelligent toss of the head from a woman who I respect was hard to take. 

The second part of my answer consisted of a completely unrelated comment about how bedbugs and cockroaches are coming back because we’ve stopped using DDT.  Shock and horror! They’ve even made it to Alaska! Apparently, even the far north has been infested.  I dislike both bedbugs and cockroaches.  I don’t want them sleeping with me.  However, I also don’t want to be bedmates with cancer.  But to tell you the truth, I have no plans to ingest DDT or cockroaches, so why was this even a part of the conversation?

I found myself in a situation so preposterous that I was actually mute.  Therefore, if you don’t mind, I’ll say to you what I wish I could have said to the others.  If you’ll remember, I grew up on a farm.  Whenever the crop-duster plane would come out, flying low in the dusty blue sky and depositing great vats of chemical from its belly, my mother would hastily herd me indoors.  I think we were done using DDT at that point as a country, but my mom still didn’t want me hanging out in a chemical field.  Thanks, mom.  I appreciate your common sense and lack of scoffing laughter.  Though why it was okay to put chemicals on our grain and the hay that would feed our cattle—which we would then ingest— I can’t quite figure out.  It is not my intention to be some extremist who can’t enjoy herself in a restaurant.  I’ve never yet tried any wheat-grass smoothies because it sounds distinctly un-tasty.  But I will if I have to—and I think I do. 

Okay, I’m done.  You may scorn me now.  Scoff on your own if you want, but please don’t write your scoff in a comment box! 

Metalhead

In which Our paranoid Heroine discovers that Cancer is really all about Marketing

“Its time to take a short break (from angels), but after these messages, we’ll be RIGHT BACK!” as said in best announcer voice.  There are some house-keeping items to take care of.  Yesterday I went to see my neurosurgeon, Dr. Bernard, also frequently deemed “brilliant” on this blog.  (In operas and musicals, main actors or actresses frequently have their own tune that accompanies them each time they enter the stage.  Think of the word brilliant as Dr. Bernard’s aria.) There is a reason he is dubbed as brilliant.  He knows things.  Things important beyond his specialty of neuro-surgery, and isn’t that saying something?  For awhile there, Jon and I thought about seeing a neuro-oncologist when we next flew out of state.  My chemo doctor recommended it because we had a few specialized questions.  Dr. Bernard is still open to giving us a referral, but I don’t know if we need it now because he knew the answers to all our questions. 

The most pressing question was whether pregnancy (not so much now, but later…) would enhance the growth of this kind of tumor.  The answer is no.  I may be paranoid usually (especially about nuclear facilities and commercialization), but this time I believe him.  My understanding is that some cancers are more directly linked with hormones: breast, ovarian, cervical, testicular, prostate, and in the brain, melingiomas (not my kind).  It makes sense, doesn’t it?  The studies on this are somewhat controversial, like so many things with cancer, but there is good evidence to suggest that these kinds of cancers particularly afflict the West. 

Why the West? Again, evidence suggests that all that processed food we’re eating is sending our hormones on un-amusing roller-coaster rides with cancer, diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease as the final big splash (no I did not say big Mac).  In my humble and cancerous opinion, these processed foods are around for the express purpose of supporting mega-companies.  They reel in the pound-adding dough, cushion their coffers, and then donate money to universities and institutes to do research on anything other than processed foods).  Have I mentioned yet that I’m paranoid? 

But conglomerates aside, Dr. Bernard asked me if I was eating a lot of fruit and vegetables.  I said I was actually thinking of going organic too.  To be truthful, paranoid me expected the currently doctor-approved line, “Oh, you can eat anything you want with cancer and you’ll be fine,” something I’d heard and read before, but didn’t necessarily believe.  Instead, my brilliant (angelic voices add to the aria) doctor smiled and said it was a great idea.  He asked if I’d heard of the raw food diet and suggested that taking red meat out of the diet might be an idea to consider too.  (The flesh is weak and hungry.  I’m not sure if I could manage that.)  I don’t know much about higher nutrition and cancer, but eating foods that are unhealthy when you already feel terrible is counter-intuitive, and taking out even one mode of control in this uncontrollable world of cancer seems hard.   Thank goodness my doctor is brilliant: I need a man I can agree with to be monitoring my health. 

Also interesting, I finally remembered to ask someone if I had a metal plate in my head from surgery—just in case I travel.  Everyone wants one more difficult thing to worry about in airports—especially us world travelers.  Yes, I can now boast a titanium plate complete with mesh and screws.  I must read Frankenstein soon.  I think I could really identify.  Maybe I’ll be carrying this book around with my specially-ordered “I have metal attached to my skull” card the next time I travel.  You know, the word lobotomy frequently flies into my head these days.  (As a reader, it is your responsibility after seeing word lobotomy to imagine hearing a loud gasp followed by the idea of horror, horror!)  

Internal commercial voice: “Hey, if you’re going to lose part of your brain, at least use a high-grade metal like Titanium® to cover the patch!!!”

Angels the Third

 In which Our Heroine is Saved Again

This will be a short post as you already know about the Hatcher’s Pass blueberry incident (see posting one).  I hope you also remember Kirsten, savior du jour.  I was less coherent during the moment of seizure, etc…, but in the ER afterward Kirsten sat by me and tiredly told me what had happened.  As she did so, it became quite clear that several miraculous things had happened: that no injury had come to Eva, that she’d been able to get me out of the water at all, and that I’d even breathed again.  She treated it lightly and suggested that she’d had some help from angels “or something” because “I tell you what, Tara, there was no way I could have done all that without help.” As she said it, I knew it to be true.  I picture in my head a painting called Nativity by an LDS artist Brian Kershisnik that I saw at BYU. 

This is one of my favorite paintings.  Notice the hordes of angels surrounding the event (as well as a wonderfully realistic Holy Family).  Again, this image flew into my mind as Kirsten told these things in that hospital room.  And so ends the third incident of the angels. 

The Second Incident of the Angels in the Roadway

In which our Lady writes a letter, or is saved the Second Time

Dear Sister-in-law Cindy,

Thank you for your comments on the latest blog posting.  It is a good question.  Why was our car so miraculously saved the first time? To be blunt as well as corny, I think I needed the point “driven” home.  I didn’t get it well enough the first time.  And so, without further ado, here is the second incident of the angels in the roadway. 

Miraculously yours,

Tara

My birthday was one week after we had moved into our new home.  I’d had a busy last month cleaning, moving, and volunteering time for a Youth Conference, so Jon decided to surprise me with an Alaskan getaway birthday present.  We were to go camping on my birthday in a beautiful little town called Valdez.  It takes 5-6 hours to get to Valdez from Anchorage, traveling up into the interior a bit to get back down to the coast.  Alaska is huge, and I have yet to see much of it.  Getting out of Anchorage for a real road trip in a state without interstates to go see Valdez’s fjord-like valleys seemed like a wonderful birthday present.  Jon was miraculously granted leave from work.  Also, miraculous was the fact that at the last minute we decided to leave our bikes and bike trailer home because we had too much stuff.  When Dahle men camp, they camp in style, so we were naturally overburdened.  Thus, we did not destroy our expensive new investment in biking. 

Yes, I did indeed use the word destroy.  I have included pictures here, for the first time on my blog just to hammer the point in.  (Yay! Finally pictures, you’re all thinking).  You’ll see here the crushed-in roof as well as some shattered glass, battered wheels, bent axels, and pummeled body work if you look closely.  You’ll also notice for future reference the two poles arranged just wide enough for us to fit/flip through.

Some small ‘towns’ are really stopping places to fuel up or use the facilities.  This is the town of Glenn-Allen, the half-way point of our journey.  It was just 8 miles south of there that we hydroplaned in the midst of a freak rainstorm.  I recall Jon saying under his breath, “We can do this…” (slide, slide, fishtale, fishtale) “we can still pull out of this...” (crank, crank) “oh no, we’re not going to make it!”  We hit the edge of the pavement with a spine-shattering jolt and we were off like a rocket run out of fuel, bouncing from high spot to high point, sailing smoothly between two large poles.  We crunched downward and (I believe) onto the top back of the car into a low spot, and then began tumbling through the brush at a different angle.  Bottom, side, top, side—it was the most awful amusement park ride you’ve ever seen.  Only a few things, like my glasses, even moved out of their places, because as our car rolled twice, the whole thing acted like water in a bucket being swung carelessly around through the air.  We landed upright with another spine-shattering jerk. 

You’ve just heard the dry details, but from my end, here’s the really interesting stuff:  While still in Glenn-Allen, I felt the strangest sense of foreboding—enough that I remember hesitating before I grasped the door handle to get in the car.  I knew something was coming.  Nevertheless, I still felt completely shocked, “This is what you had in mind!? You’ve got to be kidding me.”  This last was said in my mind very quietly, and not necessarily directed straight, but zigzag-like to heaven.  However, right after we hit the edge of the road, I believe I screamed my first prayer ever.  It was a mental shout, “Father, please protect my family!!!” Somehow, shouting in prayer seems okay given the circumstances. 

I felt calmed immediately, and felt as though my car was being guided by the angels of heaven.  Even as we were flipping around through the air, rolling in the mud, I knew we would be fine because of my previous experience with angelic powers.  We were, and finally this time I began to get the hint that forgetting these kinds of experiences is not usually the best plan.  Eva was silent until her window shattered above her, then finally screamed, but she was in the end was safe.  In fact, her mosquito bites looked worse than the cuts.  Jon and I had whiplash.  That is all. It is miraculous that we came out of it so well, that we hurt no one else, and that we didn’t hit the two poles, but went right between them.  Actually, nothing but a baby backpack and the car was destroyed.  Just a note, this backpack was repaired and worn to Hatcher’s Pass sometime in August when I foolishly decided to go blueberry picking.  It is possible that the thing is cursed.   

P.S.  Cindy, another reason why wrecking our car the second time instead of the first was better for us was because we had better car insurance the second time.  The first company was preparing to pull out of the state soon, and I think they would have fought our claim.  It turned out that Geico (company 2) paid up and even paid a little extra.      

 

Angelic Drives and Faithbuilding Experiences

In which Our Heroine is saved, the first Time

I have previously discussed how there have been difficulties in finding a place to hang my faith at times during this latest episode of my life, especially nearer the beginning.  I had some questions and had to find ways to answer them.  You’ll remember my fourth blog post about finding out I would live.  Did I mention to you that there were two weeks of not knowing how to pray for the answer to my “Will I live?” question before I received an answer?  Somehow, I found that all that faith that was good enough for a normal day wasn’t quite good enough for the big stuff.  Two weeks is a short wrestle before God, but a sincerely difficult one.  However, I am grateful that I didn’t have to start from a zero point of faith—that would have been very difficult indeed.  And it would seem very ungrateful of me (to my Heavenly Father) if I didn’t offer to you, my readers, a few of the ways that He prepared me for the end of my world.

How did he do this?  Over the past year I have had at least two experiences with angelic ministrations.  Angels among us?  Yes.  I have not mentioned them before because it is difficult to toss something so sacred and personal out onto the loud-mouth internet.  But after watching Conference yesterday, I realized that the general authorities talk about sacred stuff all the time to the world, and leave it up to the Holy Ghost to do the rest.  So, I offer to you my first tale of angelic ministration. 

It was a year ago, a winter day.  I was driving to Target and hit a patch of very black ice—invisible enough that later I actually questioned all of this.  Some of you Alaskans will know the roundabout at Minnesota and C-Street.  There will be many others of you that have driven on northern icy roads, and will know that when you hit ice and need to turn your car, the darned thing will just keep sliding in a straight trajectory toward destruction.  Turning your wheel, even in moderate amounts, will get you nowhere.  Either that, or to the wrong place quick.  There I was, going too fast and not able to get my car into that nice curve that roundabouts require.  I was quite sure I was going to crash our recently purchased car—a car that represented long hours of work and savings for our family. 

Upon this last thought, the terror hit me.  We could not suffer the loss of this car! (Well, we’ll see about that certitude in a later angel blog post.) Anyway, terrified, I opened my mouth and uttered “Heavenly Father, please help me!”  At that exact moment, my car began to turn.  It did not slow, but was on that perfect curvature. At this point my mind seemed fractured between terror and astonishment.  I experienced a second kind of fracturing here as well: I wondered just what was going on with my car, and the answer came through the Holy Ghost.  It was if I had another set of eyes (spiritual eyes) looking down on my situation from above and then again looking to the left out of my window.  It was like I was seeing three things at once (Picasso style): my current physical view along with the double spiritual vision.  I saw my red Subaru legacy had a tall broad-shouldered man just there on the left, pushing the car to make the turn for me.  I don’t remember seeing details exactly, but I had the impression he looked like one of my brothers, Bryce, and that his name was Hyrum Scott, who is an ancestor of mine.  I made it to C-Street, turned to the right, and went shopping as if my day was a perfectly ordinary day.  In the next few weeks, I thought a lot about the protection that temple covenants can offer to us and how our families really are linked for eternity. 

Counterfeit Euphoria

In which our Heroine forgets too much

I am astonished as I read this book on cancer (the one referenced in the last post) that I am already forgetting a lot of the details of my cancerous experiences.  For instance, the author speaks of feeling a separation from the land of the living as soon as he found out he had a brain tumor.  As a result, he was religious about not letting others know.  Once reminded, I also recalled this sense of separation.  A long barrier the length of the Mexican-American border, also topped with barbed wire, was suddenly erected between other healthy people and me—they could flat out do things I could not.  Additionally, others began to treat me differently—I was obviously (and suddenly) much more fragile than they.  Even if this fact was essentially true, it still felt strange to be on the cancer side of the chasm looking across at a green and fertile land I recently knew. 

One of the other things the author speaks on is the idea that non-medical practices such as meditation and prayer, done primarily by the cancer patients themselves, can really help the person’s health.  Of course this is true.  I am certain that the author missed the point here though.  There actually is a purpose in prayer.  And he was certainly wrong in not telling others and allowing them to support him in his trouble.  I know and you know that miracles happen.  My eldest brother tells me that he thinks the reason I’m doing so well is because of these things. 

Paradoxically, I recognize that I am currently practicing my own methods of self-destruction.  Every day I pretend that all is well and cancer is no longer a threat.  I do have some wonderful assurances that things will be fine in the end.  Allowances aside, this is still a primary threat, yes?  It is naïve to think it suddenly gone and naiveté can only get me so far if an MRI scan comes up negative.  In the afore-mentioned text I will soon read how changing my diet to exclude processed foods can really help my body beat this illness.  I came to myself around 4 pm this afternoon stuffing a large snickers bar into my mouth.  In despair, I realized my self-destruct mode must stop.  Unfortunately, I may also have to lose my counterfeit sense of euphoria. 

All Creatures Great and Small

In which our Heroine reads a Book

“Cancer lies dormant in all of us.  Like all living organisms, our bodies are making defective cells all the time.  That’s how tumors are born.  But our bodies are also equipped with a number of mechanisms that detect and keep such cells in check.  In the West, one person in four will die of cancer, but three in four will not.  Their defense mechanisms will hold out, and they will die of other causes.”  So says David Servan-Schreiber, MD, PhD in Anti-cancer: A New Way of Life, (2^nd edition, page 7), a book I began just this afternoon.  How absolutely frightening to think that we all have the beginnings of cancer within us.  Stopping with this only this single thought is debilitating in its finality. 

While still in hospital, a kind friend of mine—also a cancer survivor—came to visit.  She brought me the gift of a MOTAB CD and a CD player, complete with batteries, to put the CD in.  She told me that she listened to these and a few other selections of hymns for several years each night before bed.  As I already was spending my sleepless (steroid-driven) hours thinking through hymn lyrics, I found the gift particularly appropriate.  At that point in my broken life and body, I had no room for the media of the world.  I needed maximum healing and comfort.  Her gift was perfect.  One hymn on that compilation was a beautiful rendition of All Things Bright and Beautiful, a hymn less well known to me.  The song expresses the idea that 1) Heavenly Father made many beautiful wonders in our world for which we can exercise gratitude, and 2) All things are in his power.  

What a comfort to think of the control that Heavenly Father had over every single cell in my body.  It was a beginning, a foundation on which to build my faith.  I figured that if He wanted me dead, I’d already be there, as I’d survived a few harrowing experiences already that year (black ice while driving, a terrible car crash in June, and enough time without breath to turn blue on that fateful blueberry day—the day that began it all).  Each time I’d come out of these experiences, I’d had the feeling that I’d done so because it was Heavenly Father’s will.  I could not doubt that same will now, constant and unchanging as I knew Him to be. 

There are many things to be frightened of in this world, but to focus on the fear is only paralyzing.  After a short time of this despairing emotional paralysis, I had finally found a place for my faith. 

Memories of Spring Wheat

In which Our Lady relishes in a good Memory.

            I thought briefly about saving this memory for a spring day, or even just a really wintery one so I could be thinking spring-like thoughts.  But it is too good to wait and I really can’t think of a good autumnal anecdote just now.  I don’t remember how old I was, but I think it must have been junior-high or high school age and it was evening on my step-dad’s farm.  He was a good man, but one that I often misunderstood.  Here I pay tribute to him and transport you into one of my memories Harry-Potter-style to share a bit of his wisdom. 

                As a background, my mother and my step-dad married when I was six.  Of their courtship, I remember him being very charming to a little girl as we all sat in our living room.  I liked him.  He played fun games with me and teased me when he came to visit.  I really had no idea there was someone he was kind of trying to replace, so to me it was just fun and games.  I still have the sense that my mother was more skittish than an unbroken colt, so he must have had to work really hard to get her. 

My next solid memory skips to the chilly morning of their honeymoon in November.  They were driving me to my grandmother’s house for babysitting.  I did not attend the marriage, as it was in the temple, and I was not invited.  I asked them where “we” were going on our honeymoon.  Of course, they laughed heartily at that, and I got a big shock when I found I was not invited to this either.  Well, so much for the threesome-ness of our courtship.  

His name was Glade, and I always called him by his given name.  He was a good father to me, and passed away about five years ago after an old age lived young via his step-daughter.  He would delight me and my friends with his terrible but hilarious table manners and his “punny” jokes.  He liked those hokey Hawaiian tunes that the women of the buoyantly-curled hair would sing on the Lawrence Welk show, as well as Hugh Nibley, and Johnny Cash.  I’m sure each of them was a great influence to his personal work.  You judge.  Here is my favorite poem of his, composed carefully:

I once had a pig with a nose that could dig,

All around, in the ground, in the dirt.

It didn’t look hard, so I tried it in my yard.

I did it all right, but boy did it hurt!     

                The opening of the memory I’d like to focus on finds the two of us suddenly standing at the edge of one of his wheat fields in the spring, me with my spare teen body, and he with his trucker hat, blue button down shirt, blue jeans, and brown work boots, which always smelled of earth.  I would contrast his slow and maddeningly methodical manner with my own youthful impatience.  I remember being ready to move onto the next subject, whatever that was, and feeling an indefinable irritation at standing there just staring out across the land.  The sun was setting low in the sky, putting out golden light sideways onto the bright green wheat shoots, most only inches high, yet sending out shadows two feet in length.  There were long furrows of these shoots spread out horizontally across the distance almost as far as I could see. 

“Look at that!” he said ecstatically.  At this point, you should imagine someone from what you would assume is my grandparent’s generation saying these words, as he was quite a bit older than my mom.  Think Lawrence Welk.  Again: “Just look at that!” said with genuine marvel and a shake of the head.  “I am amazed every time they come out of the ground like this in the spring. It’s a miracle.”  At first all l I could think of was just how many springs that had been.  He seemed truly amazed and grateful that each little seedling had decided to grace us with its presence, though there were hundreds.  I felt a question, nothing specific, form in my mind and opened my eyes a little wider to see what he was seeing.  He was right.  It was a miracle.  And the evening was beautiful in a way that few evenings ever are.