What does that look like to you?

Yesterday, I honored the reminder calls, letters and calendar notes all prompted by my doctor’s automated reminders, and went for my mammogram.  My husband decided to go with me.  I told him I didn’t really need this, but it seemed as good a way to spend a little time together as anything, sort of reminiscent of all those pre-baby check-ups, and so there we were, flipping through magazines and newspapers in the basement of the Fabiola building, waiting for my turn. 

The x-ray tech was the same one who did my first mammogram last year, and we have a friend in common, so we chatted, while she positioned and compressed my breasts in the odd sandwiching device.  Then she brought in the films.

She put them up, same as last time, and started talking amiably about fibrocystic tissue (cloudy) vs. fatty tissue (not so cloudy) but I couldn’t listen.  There, in the picture of my left breast, was very clearly a little ball of white– about the size of one of those superballs the kids get in the vending machines for a quarter.  I interrupted her–”Look!  There’s something!”  She smiled and said,”Don’t interrupt!  I’ll get there in a minute.”  Then she explained how the radiologist would look at the x-rays, decide whether to call me in for more, yadayadayada– I couldn’t really focus on what she was saying.

The little white ball looked sort of swirly, like a satellite picture of a hurricane.  “What does that look like to you?” I whispered to my husband.  “I’m sure it’s nothing.” he said back.  I think, I’m pretty sure, he just meant to be reassuring.  I’m convinced I’ll get a call today, telling me to come in for another look.  I know the odds are that it is nothing, a cyst if anything. 

 But I know what I don’t want it to be.  But I wonder– am I really so paranoid, such a hypochondriac, that my eyes would so clearly see a ball in my mammogram that others don’t see?  I keep thinking about a family we’re fairly close to– the mom was so healthy and strong.  She was helping with the costumes for the school play last May, when she told me she had the flu, and felt lousy.  But it wasn’t the flu.  And now her family must go on without her. 

Whatever the ball is or isn’t– I want to hold my little ones a little closer today.  I don’t want to go to work, but I’m going. I’m going to try not to jump out of my skin every time the phone rings.  I’m going to smile at everyone I see. 

Warming the Hearth

We had our very first fire in our fireplace a few weeks ago.  I have always loved fireplaces, and dreamed of a house where I could build cozy fires, and curl up and gaze at the flames.  My husband, though, grew up in a home with two fireplaces, which were never used, a single time.  He deeply mistrusted the concept of building a fire in the living room, and really didn’t want to use ours.  

When I was little, though, some of the best, most exciting, loving and joyful of family times revolved around Dad building a roaring fire in the huge brick fireplace in our living room.  At least, it seemed huge to me then.  I would sit on the bricks, chin in hand, and ponder why the fire was blue as it emerged from the log, turning to the classic yellow orange fire color.  And of course, the desire to poke. prod and put things in the fire was just about irresistable to the four of us.  One of my brothers even grabbed my Donald Duck bath bubbles bottle, the empty one my Mom had saved to let me play with, and threw it in the fire to see what would happen.  I screamed, as Donald melted, bowed forward in one last, deep, gracious departure, my brother making agonized Donald Duck melting sounds to add to the drama of Donald bowing, then melting, then bursting into vile smelling flame.  This story did not reassure my husband that having fires would actually be good for the family.

But I promised to carefully supervise all fires, and finally called a chimney sweep, who turned out to be someone I knew a long time ago, who won over my husband’s trust.    He swept the chimney, certified it was safe to use, and I bought firewood and laid the fire.  Our children knew exactly what to do–they pulled pillows and blankets up to the hearth, and spent the evening gazing dreamily into the flames, their little cheeks rosy, until they fell asleep.  I know the smoke from a fire is pollution, I know it’s an inefficient way to heat the house, but the pure, primal pleasure of warming your face at the hearth of your home is beyond compare. 

We have made three fires, now– each time, we have repeated the ritual of cuddling in front of the fire, talking softly, falling into deep sleep. As people have done, through the ages.

Saddam’s Hanging

That night, we were at my father in law’s house in LA.  I saw a streaming headline on the TV that said the hanging would take place, but I was still shocked when I went out to the living room to check on my DH, who had fallen asleep on the couch, and glanced up at the tv screen to see Saddam being fitted with the rope around his neck. 

Shia people danced in the street.  Sunnis rioted.  What will it all mean for Iraq?  For us?  I think that some likely hope that without Saddam, the violence will subside.  Others think the civil war was inevitable, anyway, so why not rid the world of him.  After all, the only reason Bush the first did not remove Saddam from power when he had the chance, was that nobody else on the horizon looked even remotely capable of holding that country together. And in the years since, Saddam was dead clever about murdering anybody who looked as though they could possibly lay claim to leadership, so he could keep it that way.   

 So now, by default, someone else will have to figure out what to do to hold Iraq together.  And the most astute comment I have read on that subject was from a San Diego barber who was being interviewed about troop deployment– there’s going to be another Saddam, or someone worse. 

Madeline Allbright and Bill Clinton knew that Iraq would fall apart into civil war without Saddam Hussein.  He was the devil we knew.  He was bad, but untold chaos was in store without him.  They chose not to go after him militarily, but sought to bring him to heel with the pressure of economic sanctions, which took a terrible toll on Iraq, but which kept the Iraqi military within its own borders.  But they understood very well what would happen without Saddam. 

Now, courtesy of George W., who conveniently ignored everyone who told him Iraq would devolve into chaos without Saddam, we will have the devil we don’t know.  Tony Blair once said about 500,000 people had been murdered or tortured to death by Saddam.  For all the people who suffered because of Saddam, I hope the hanging brings some sense of peace and the ability to move on in peace and dignity.   Saddam’s crimes were of historic proportion, and however chaotic the trial looked to our American eyes (although, with Judge Judy and her ilk, maybe it didn’t seem so odd)  the resulting sentence was predictable but fair.  And we shouldn’t be so shocked that the execution lacked decorum.  This hanging looked like the wild west because these people are living under wild west conditions.  At least they had the trial.   

But now how many more have suffered or died miserably because of Bush’s misadventure?  Has all our own sacrifice served to accomplish nothing more than to compound Saddam’s crimes?   And now, we face a new era of nuclear proliferation among Islamist nations.  We face the proliferation of incredibly nihilistic religious thought.   I know a lot of people who supported this war thought it would result in something good.  But that goal, if it ever was in reach, seems to have slipped from our grasp. Because the devil we don’t know may just actually have what Saddam lacked– real, functioning WMD’s, courtesy of Iran’s “peaceful and legitimate” nuclear program.