Closed Curtains

So this is kind of uncomfortable to talk about, but we are experiencing the first serious illness of one of our friends. I need to be somewhat vague on this whole thing, but it's disturbing, and distressing. At this stage in our life, we should be bitching about poopie diapers and hectic days filled with too much to do.

We have a friend fighting for her life. With stage IV Breast cancer that has spread. My husband is in the thick of it, serving as a medical translator at times, sourcing new information and relaying encouraging words from experts in the field. But mostly? Mostly he's being there for his friend.

She is writing as this process unfolds, and I find her writing, in all of its honesty, to be completely disarming. I've always felt like mortality was this kind of curtain, that is always in front our our face but we choose to not see. When something happens- something like this- I feel like the curtain is whipped away and we're forced to look at something that has been there with us all along. Does that make sense? The Italians have an old saying- if you ask them how they are doing, they reply:
"Fine. For now."

They get it. They get that time is fleeting and that the shit will hit the fan eventually. It made this mothers day that much more bittersweet, and I must confess that I scooped up my little ones and hugged them a bit longer.