Infernal Clock

My husband is an early riser. Time was when I used to get up with him, because it seemed so romantic to spend a little time together in the morning. Lately our alarm has two alarm settings: O-Dark Hundred Hour for him, and 6:15 for me.

Last week, after my honey had been gone for 6 days and returned with major jet lag, he set the clock ahead by mistake while setting his alarm. It practically went off before the eleven o'clock news finished. He arrived at work before at 5:15 AM and I was out of the shower by 5:30. We only realized the mistake when I tried to wake our new teenager, who screamed at me for getting her up an hour early. Whoops!

We've had that clock for years and it has always sucked. It's hard to read. The buttons don't make any sense. It's hard to turn off. So we resolved to get a new clock.

Being very type A, the man arrived home with the brand new equipment on Saturday. It's shiny silver. It can recharge my phone. You can set the alarms for a week in advance. It has a remote. He was very excited about it on Saturday night. And being quite the traveler this month, he left for California on Sunday afternoon.

You know where I'm going with this, don't you? My sweet man set the new clock before he left for California, but didn't share that information with me. When it went off Monday morning at 5:15, I was shocked and stunned by its ear drum-shattering shriek and by my inability to turn it off. Then I couldn't get back to sleep.

Later I had my revenge. Once I realized that I could not figure out the remote control, I yanked the plug, confident that Tuesday morning that I would get some sleep. Sadly I was wrong. The clock's brightly lit face might have been blank, but the alarm soldiered on, shattering my nerves at, you guessed it, 5:15. I hit it the same way I did on Monday only to have it fight back – it rang again ten minutes later, just after I fell back asleep. Ok, we're on, you little f*!%$r. I picked up the clock and threw it, still ringing, into my daughter's room down the hall. I quickly closed the door. (She was sound asleep in my bed.)

You'd think that was the end of it, wouldn't you? I could see that this clock is designed for a person way beyond my pay grade. But I had one last trick up my sleeve. I shoved the clock into my linen closet last night, covering the speakers with flannel sheets. This morning I don't know whether the clock went off or not. I was busy sleeping.

What's Next?

The cancer's gone. I finished my treatment about ten days ago and have been given a clean bill of health. I have to go to a couple of check ups in a few months, but have been sent back into the world to live my life. This is wonderful fabulous news.

What's next?

I keep asking myself that question. Before my friends at Dana Farber sent me away, they sat me down to tell me about something called "Ending Treatment Effect." The nurse who described it made it sound something like post-partum depression. Kind of ironic, since the whole cancer trip took about nine months. At any rate, a few tears are normal, but if I find myself hanging out on the couch in my pajamas and crying for days on end, I'm supposed to call someone. So far so good - I'm wearing pajamas only at night.

But I see what they mean. For so many months my life has been defined by appointments and treatments. I've scheduled getting poked and prodded and waiting to feel bad. I've timed my life in the context of how much I can get done during the twenty minutes I feel good. And now I have to go back to the schedule and the me that was before. Except I'm not the me that was before. So what's next?

I don't know. I'm working on making peace with the fact that the next few months, maybe even nine months, will be a work in process, just like the last nine. But one thing I have decided is to pick up one important new habit – going to the gym. To inspire and provoke me in the process, I've signed up to ride my bike in the Pan Mass Challenge. I plan to ride 88 miles on a very hot day in August in order to raise money for Dana Farber. After all, they sent me back out into the world. Isn't it only right that I send something back? And through the process, I hope to find out what's next.