We come in, the three of us, my brother, father and I. The place is as I remember it. Although this time there’s this odd difference that it isn’t me with cancer, not at the moment, but my father. Not quite so much of the frightened animal me, just sad me.
Across the room I see a man I knew 30 years ago. As we recognize each other it is a familiar knowing from a time in my life when there was great hope for social change. And we both believed. His wife arrives shortly, a woman misshapen by her tumors, smiling, smiling. She launches into a non-stop soliloquy on a Solstice fair we have in this city with old anarchist roots, where people make floats and are carefree. She made one, a float, once. Got a grant to do it. I could too, she assures me, if I just apply. I smile back, remembering how cancer makes you insane. And so in need of connecting.
I excuse myself to go help dad with the endless forms. I feel impatient and slowly become aware of a low humming din, there since we entered. I focus. We’re in one of those light filled, open floored buildings. The hum is from the floor below. I look over. There are ten or so older women. A sign says they are “knitting for life.” Their chatting the source of the din. My heart fills with gratitude at the solace I feel, just looking at them. The group, with their needles and their determination for connection and not to go insane.
It gives me strength to get through the thing itself. At least that afternoon.