:-{

A friend of mine was just diagnosed with melanoma.

Finding this out makes feelings come up that, if I were a character in a movie or a novel, I would manifest to the reader, or audience, by pouring myself a stiff one, or seven, but because I am a person IRL and not a fictional character, I know better, and besides, it wouldn’t do any good.

I know it wouldn’t do any good. I haven’t gone down that road, because I have eyes and can see that it leads to no good place. There isn’t even a good place to go.

The good place to go would be for me to fly up to see her, perhaps tag along when she goes to the doctor, hold her hand, and say, “There, there, it will be okay,” except that the last thing she needs is an old college friend in her hair, and she already knows what to do and how to handle it, and besides, it might not be okay. Or it might be. But it isn’t something I can control, or even affect.

My friend, who lives in Maine, is a stay-at-home mom with small sons, no job, and one of those crappy ex-husbands. I could send a cute thing that says, “Hey I am thinking  of you,” and I can think of plenty of great things to send (Peeps, anyone?) but I also know how much good it won’t do.

I find myself a blinking idiot, looking online for a present to send, and yet knowing that for all of my hopes, I can’t do anything. I hate feeling powerless, and I hate knowing that I am.