“Remember, no man is a failure who has friends”
(It’s A Wonderful Life)

They say that you can tell who your real friends are in times of crisis, and there is nothing quite as crisis-making as having a possibly terminal illness. I’ve heard stories from friends in similar situations who have been terribly hurt and let down by people who turned their backs in times of serious need. I was lucky that this only happened to me once [ * ] during this whole cancer ordeal, right at the beginning of it, and that since then I have felt nothing but love and support from the people I am fortunate to call my friends…

[ * ] well, my immediate family also dumped me (Joe & Olivia excepted) but as Nog says, that’s what families are for.  😉

Asking for help has always been difficult for me, but you guys really helped me out with that. And every one of you has given me something special that has helped me get through these past nine months.  There were the donations that helped me keep a roof over my head, there were scrabble games galore, the daily comments on my blog that always lifted my spirits, surprise gifts that came in the mail, Christmas and Birthday cards, tapa lunches, day trips (and one very memorable weekend road trip), phone calls,  IM chats, hospital visits, help with all that day-to-day stuff (thanks, Nog!), not having to go to doctor’s appointments alone, friends keeping me company during chemo and someone once even staying overnight with me because I was afraid. They were all so important and so very much appreciated.

In yoga class my teacher Ana sometimes does this thing during the relaxation bit at the end,  while we’re lying down on our backs with our eyes closed … she asks us to recall one of our happiest memories and to focus on the feelings attached to it. Used to be that I would really struggle to remember something happy,  but when Ana did this yesterday my mind flashed around several wonderul recent memories before homing in on me & Pip on our road trip, driving along the coast and laughing ourselves to sleep in that wonderfully quirky hotel in San Roque.  And I was suddenly crying happy tears.

Because the thing was … I actually had to choose a happy memory! And that’s all your doing.  Somehow you guys have managed to turn the worst time of my life into the one most filled with happy memories. I don’t know what I ever did to deserve friends like you, but I hope that for the rest of my life I will prove myself worthy.