The past 2 years - 2 steps away

It's hard to see the fear inside
As I walk away from you
And distance overcomes the miles
As slowly I pull through
And I cannot reach the world today
Cuz I'm suffering from you
And the more I think, the more I cry
As I walk away from you

I'm two steps away
From loneliness

I'm awake
From the mess we made
I'm alive
And I'm feeling incomplete

I don't understand my life
Or the version that chose you
And the warring hearts and winter came
Now there's nothing left to do
And I cannot reach the world today
Cuz I'm suffering from two
And the more I think, the more we die
As I walk away from you

Two steps away
From loneliness
I'm awake
From the mess we made
I'm alive
And I'm feeling incomplete

I'm two steps away

I'm two steps away
I'm two steps away

Two steps away
From loneliness
I'm awake
From the mess we made
I'm alive
And I'm feeling incomplete

I'm two steps away

- Patti LaBelle
Timeless Journey

My roommate, my friend, my hero.

Diana is my roommate. She's a great roommate. She's never loud, she isn't too messy, and she lets me watch NCIS marathons on Saturday afternoons. She also has amazing taste in clothes, just like me.



Diana is my good friend. She listens to me and cares about my life. We laugh a lot and we've certainly had some great adventures together.

Diana is also my hero, defined as someone who is admired for their brave deeds. I admire Diana for many or her brave deeds like working with the teenagers at church, always being honest with others and helping those in need.

Recently, Diana faced a personal fear of something new and unknown and joined Team In Training. Not only will she complete her first 10K in October, she is also raising $500 for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

I am so proud of my roommate, my friend and my hero, Diana. No brave deed goes unnoticed and while I'm sure that Diana would humbly decline the title of hero, I'm sure those who are battling blood cancers would want to cheer her on.

I hope you'll help cheer her on, too.

http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/MC10K09/ddelamare_LTN

www.teamintraining.org

I love my job. I can't think of anything that I would rather do than my job. Call it whatever you want, but I've definitely drank the Team In Training Kool-Aid and I am trying my best to share it with others.

This summer marks the five year anniversary of Roger Miller's lymphoma diagnosis. A few short months later, he passed away. As the leader of our congregation, his absence was felt on so many levels. It had only been two months since he had given me some of the best advice I had ever heard, "Anywhere worth going is always uphill" and there we all were, struggling uphill through grief toward understanding.

I stumbled upon LLS and TNT quite by accident a few months later and it all seemed so clear. I was going to complete a triathlon and I was going to do it in memory and honor of a man who I knew would always inspire me to keep going uphill. I joined the Team and became a part of a family of amazing athletes who strive for cures, one mile at a time. I was nervous and overwhelmed and so often afraid of failure but the coaches and the staff were always there to encourage me in my uphill battle and help me toward my personal finish line. Less than a year later, I found myself crossing the actual finish line of the Disney World Triathlon, having a new sense of self awareness and more confidence than I had ever felt.

It is one of my greatest blessings to spend my time and energy with such an amazing group of talented professionals, volunteers and advocates as we all work together to cure cancer, improve the lives of patients and their families and help as many as will break through the tape at the end of their own uphill climbs.

GO TEAM!!

I'm fresh out of answers and good jokes.

I hardly blog anymore. It sucks really. I used to really enjoy looking at my life and laughing at the funny things that happen to me and how they relate to principles that seemed important. Not so much anymore.

I can't decide whether it's because I've become so cynical that I only see cruel irony instead of amuzing or it's because after enough disappointment in life, I've grown tired of hearing those hollow sounding principles echo in the chambers of my empty heart. Who knows?

I love my job. I was recently given an amazing opportunity to lead the Team In Training campaign at our LLS chapter here in DC. I work with some of the best people on the planet - no kidding. All of my coworkers are awesome and I can't imagine working anywhere else. We are a dedicated group of professionals busting our butts to raise as much money to fund critical research for cures for blood cancers as well as fund the best programs and services for folks who are fighting cancer.

You would think that after three years, I would somehow become accustomed to learning about someone else who is fighting cancer but it never gets easy or less painful to find out that yet again, someone you love and admire has cancer.

One of our interns was told recently that her cancer is back. She's young and trying to finish grad school and has her whole life ahead of her and she's already beat blood cancer twice. Now, she has to fight for her life again and I don't think that's fair.

I've quit asking why because there is no good answer for that question and I am plum out of my funny jokes and light hearted banter to ease away the worry, fear and sadness. She has to fight again and she might not win and that sucks.

I am certainly passionate about what I do and I can live without a lot of things. I've proven to myself that I can still keep breathing and living and successfully manage most things in my life while silently suffering in the silent chambers of my own soul. I know that I'm never going to be that Flicted Friend that Randy and Charles laughed at so much all those years ago. That's OK to me - it's part of growing up that I've fully accepted and welcomed in some ways.

But what I don't think I am going to be able to survive is watching those I love and care for suffer over and over. Where is the balm in Gilead for them?

Straight up - that's how I feel.

Is the crust really the best part?

I just finished reading Same Kind of Different as Me - by Ron Hall & Denver Moore. On the cover it says, "A modern-day slave, an international art dealer and the unlikely woman who bound them together."

One of the volunteers that I work with recommended it to me last year and I've just now had the courage to read it. This volunteer is an amazing woman who lost her 4 year old son to leukemia six years ago. Amidst their pain, they brought together a community of supporters and have been instrumental in raising tens of thousands of dollars that have gone to research and patient services. They've also started their own family foundation that gives financial support to families in their community who have children who are fighting cancer.

I wanted to share a paragraph that is echoing in the empty halls of my heart these past few days.

From Denver's words, "I know when somebody you love is gone, that's the last time you feel like thanking God. But sometimes we has to be thankful for the things that hurt us cause sometimes God does things that hurts us but they helps somebody else (p. 211)."

Elder Neal A. Maxwell taught, "Irony is the hard crust on the bread of adversity" (Ensign, May 1989). I feel like I've been carbo-loading for the past two years and I'm stuffed.

You would think that when someone says, "You have been an answer to my prayers" that I would feel like the personification of a miracle, empowered, humbled, awed, overwhelmed and grateful for being an instrument in the Lord's Hand in bringing respite and relief to one or more of His children in need. Most of the time, I do.

But sometimes, I don't.

In fact, there have been times that I've said in my heart, "I'm glad your prayers were answered, but what about mine?" You would think that I would love to receive this ultimate compliment to me and my humble and spiritually discerning self (please hear my sarcasm).

If I'm 100% honest about how I feel in my heart, sometimes being the answer to someone's prayer is hard. How ironic is that? I give and in return there's pain.

Welcome to the Savior's life, Tracy.

In a similar vein, Elder Maxwell also cautioned not to wait around the altar of sacrifice for a receipt from the Lord. I guess the Lord won't overlook my constant loitering any longer so maybe I should take one last look at what's there and let it go.

Like Denver said, "sometimes God does things that hurts us but they helps somebody else." He goes on to say, "If you want to know the truth about it, nothin ever really ends but begins somewhere else where we can't hear it or see it or feel it."

Walking away - walking away - looking back - walking away - walking away.

Fe = Better Tracy

The color is starting to come back - hallelujah.

It's more than official, I'm certifiably anemic. Three IV iron treatments in six years, does anyone see a pattern developing?

Too bad I have to go and let myself go to hell before I'll actually do anything about it. I chewed so much ice in the last eight months, I actually cracked my only crown. Now, I'll have to sell a kidney to pay for the dental repair.

Monday was a long day but at least I left knowing I would feel better. Unfortunately, anemics aren't the only ones who visit the hematologist, so do cancer patients. During my six hour treatment, three other patients were in and out, all receiving chemotherapy, all fighting cancer and all hoping for a miracle.

It was a long day of reality check. Life's still not fair. Fair is where you go to see the pig races. Yep, life is tough and all of us are sick in one way or another, hoping for a miracle.

New Moon - Chapter 4

Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.

Bella Swan, New Moon, Chapter 4, p.93

It's true - thanks Bella for saying it.

Grandmas are the best.

My mom - the best grandma in the world - with her little ones: Maya Rose, Mason Wesley, Annabella Sophia and Riley Lane. Give us a month and we'll have Nina Elizabeth joining us :) Family, nothing better.

Don't take your eye off her for a minute!

Maya Rose - she's going to be a heart breaker and maybe break a few other things while she's at it! In less than a month, she will be the middle child of my sister's three girls. THREE GIRLS!

My sister, Marty, will have a house full of girls and I can't imagine anyone better suited for the job. It's funny how life can sometimes replay itself over and over. I find it interesting how much her oldest, Annabella, is similar to me in her personality and desire to please others and always follow the rules.

Then there's Maya Rose. You can't take your eye off her for a minute or she'll be at the top if the stairs or the slide. She's a mover and a shaker and marches to the beat of her own little drum, just like her mom :) It's a good thing that my sister is the one with all the girls. Her girls will grow up confident and unafraid and will make wonderful contributions to the world around them, just like their mom!

Watch out world! Here they come :)

We aren't that kind of family.

This is Riley Layne. She's five and is my second oldest niece. She, and her brother Mason, live near my parents and they have the good fortune of spending lots of time with Bonna and Granpy. Last weekend, Riley and Mason spent some quality time with Bonna. In one day, they baked sugar cookies with the leftover dough from the holidays, made peanut butter pine cone bird feeders, spent some time mulching the flower beds and dyed Easter eggs.

After a really full day, Bonna said to Riley, "Maybe you and Mason can make some more peanut butter pine cone bird feeders at your house."

Riley looked back at my mother and said (rather incredulously), "We aren't that kind of family."

My mom, holding back a laugh, asked, "What do you mean, Riley, you aren't that kind of family."

Without skipping a beat, she replied "We don't do those kinds of things at our house, Bonna." You've got to love five year olds.

2009, just in time

I will write again, I know I will. Somewhere inside of me are the words just waiting to come out. 2008 sucked the very life out of me. I have little to nothing left of what I was two years ago and it pisses me off that I'm as lost as I am. I'm not even at square one, I'm at square negative 10 or something. 2009 could not have come soon enough. I promise, this year, I will write and it will be meaningful and not full of anger or malice or sarcasm, all the things that I have felt. Those things are not me. I am on a mission to find the real Tracy and bring her home to stay. The malice has run its course and left its mark. Now, I have to turn my face towards something better or the true Flicted Friend that I loved will be lost forever. Maybe tomorrow when I'm running 5 miles in the snow, I'll trip and have a new story to share :) I'll keep you posted.