The Big C

"The tumor is cancer," wrote my brother via a text message.

I was in Vegas for an 8-day stint with my company and I learned that the tumor that was recently found was indeed cancer. I was hoping that the large mass in his esophagus was benign and that it could be removed with surgery, but my brother’s text proved that the "C" word was back, this time in a much scarier state.

This wasn’t the first cancer battle for my dad. A few years back, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. For some reason back then, the diagnosis didn’t shake me. I felt confident that he would be fine after treatment and he was. He opted to have radium pellets inserted and the tiny bullets did the job.

After the initial cancer diagnosis, life quickly settled back into a routine. My dad turned 80 and then two years later, so did my mom. Their retirement years were humming along. During that spring, we sat around the kitchen table and the subject of traveling came up.

"Where have you always wanted to go?" I asked my dad.

"I’ve always wanted to go see Pearl Harbor."

Dad had served two years in the Second World War, landing in Guam and facing battles in Guadacanal and Okinawa. After the war ended, he stayed for the Occupation of China before heading home to marry my mom. He rarely shared the bloody side of the war, preferring to remember the buddies he hung with and the people he met along the way, including a little orphan who the soldiers befriended.

My Dad once snuck away from his company to grab an ice cream bar from the PX.  He soon heard his name being called and stood to attention--with the ice cream bar melting away in his back pocket.  There wasn't much of the ice cream to salvage after he returned to his quarters.

So, on that spring morning, we impulsively decided to book our trip to Hawaii. We had never done anything so last minute, so unplanned. It’s too expensive, we always thought. Yet, there we were-- my parents and my sister—flying over the ocean to a state that we had never imagined finally seeing.

It was a glorious week in Hawaii. We rented a car and drove around the island. We spent two days at Pearl Harbor and my Dad quietly reflected about the war. We took a dinner tour on a boat and enjoyed the dancers swinging their hips around us. It was supposed to be a sunset cruise, but the clouds hung around for a long time. I had hoped to snap a photo of a Hawaiian sunset, but it didn’t look like I would be able to capture a single ray. In the middle of our meal, the clouds suddenly parted. I grabbed my camera and ran outside to capture the stunning sunset that peeked out.

After that magical week, we talked about taking another trip, this time out east to see the World War II Memorial. We talked about heading out there this spring, but I took a full-time job and I kept putting off the trip.

"Let’s aim for this fall," I said.

Now here I am, sitting in the doctor’s office, waiting for the guy in the white coat to come in and discuss the "options." It has been a tough week. Thirty-one pounds have melted off Dad’s frame as he struggles each day to coax food down a tight pathway that is blocked by the ominous tumor.

I think about the trip that was postponed, and hoping that we have another someday to take that trip.

"What do you hope to get from treatment?" the doctor asks.

"My wife is a great cook," said my Dad. "I’d just like to be able to eat again."

His answer makes me smile. Here I am thinking, I want him to travel again, and he’s got food on his mind.

So I’m envisioning us sitting around a restaurant in Washington D.C. and Dad polishing off a plate of food.

Please God, let us have that opportunity.

This is an original Chicago Moms Blog post.  Karen Putz also blogs at A Deaf Mom Shares Her World and is a writer for Disaboom.