Look for the Pink Flowers
March 2022

Today I walked into a cancer center. It wasn’t the first time. I had cancer many years ago, when youth was on my side and I didn’t feel too entangled in anything to feel the grief of letting it go. I stared death in its uncaring face back then and I can do it again. Only this time I’m tired – really tired. The pain level is high and I have more times of not feeling well, than times of feeling well enough to have a half-way productive day. I am hopeful my diagnosis is not cancer this time, while at the same time have prayed for peace no matter what I find out.

Today I sat in my car in the parking lot and looked up at the big brick building that reaches high into the sky. The building I was about to enter. The building with a big “CANCER CENTER” sign strewn across it so you can read the sign from afar –driving north or south on I-35, or from the frontage road. You don’t have to be close-up to know what’ happening in that building. There’s a certain grim-reaping sterility to the structure where countless people are getting dreaded diagnoses, undergoing life-altering and possibly life-saving treatments, and family members wait, scrolling their phones in defenseless gestures as if short-term distractions can really save them from the long-term ramifications of the C diagnosis.

Before I walked across the parking lot and through the automatic doors that lead to a myriad of cancer-related orifices in that monstrous building, I sat in my old car, feeling its comfort as I practiced calming breathing techniques my spiritual director had taught me. Regardless of all the layers I wore, the snapping chill of March that danced through the air crept into the car, invading my space. I shivered, put on the covid-preventing mask still required to access the building, and got out of the car.

Today I walked into the cancer center. This one, 600 miles from the one I walked into many years ago when blood pooled at my feet and my hair was still naturally blonde, felt like completion. It was as if somehow I’d lived for over 20 years since my last diagnosis with that sense of “borrowed time”, trying so hard to make life right this time so this never happened to me again, while always in the background my soul knew that life has a date to expire no matter how hard we try to outrun it. This time I was less surprised, and in some ways, more accepting. 

I remember the compassion I was given when I had cancer in my youth. I had calls from a doctor asking how I was, and people brought me gifts and cards and flowers. They even offered to take me for a walk in the park during my recovery so I could breathe in air that wasn’t stale. I remember how, in spite of all the goodness, I felt so very alone. My tears were mine, and on more than one occasion I had felt like giving up due to the nature of my cancer and what it meant to my future as a woman who would no longer be able to conceive. Since then, I am a changed person who doesn’t worry so much about how life is supposed to look, but focus more on trying to just be in each moment and live that precious spot in time with depth, gratitude and a sense of "this is enough". I believe this is what my faith as a Christian invites me to do. I still falter with this at times, but the sense of peace that comes with less doing and more just being is life-altering.  

Today I walked into the cancer center and I felt numb. The waiting room was filled with people – mostly couples. I didn’t worry this time about being alone. I didn’t feel the need to fill out the huge stack of intake paperwork to perfection. I didn’t worry about saying all the right things to the many questions the doctor asked. I tried to trust her kind, compassionate approach. I felt a bit like perhaps life was punishing me for my imperfections. I tried to push those thoughts away and remember how much grace we are given by Christ. 

Grief overcame me as I realized I wasn't ready to say goodbye to this life, while knowing it's not really my decision, but God’s. I felt a sense of mourning for all the years that have passed during which I’ve struggled with chronic health issues - illnesses that, although I live through the lens that I am capable and healthy, in spite of some challenges, get so wrapped into each other. In honesty, there are so many things I've been unable to do and that takes acceptance, but grief surrounding it never quite leaves. I faced my failures and regrets all at once, knowing how toxic it is to even let their images and shameful, shaking fingers enter my field of vision. I entered the cancer center with an awareness that something had shifted recently in my life – I felt the spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, quite strongly in the few days leading up to this appointment. I felt protected, but also reluctance to proceed. I prayed and asked God to give me strength and peace.

Today as I walked toward the building where I would find out more about what’s diseasing my body, I noticed the greening grass and tiny up-reaching of springtime bulbs as they they began their awakening,  stretching their arms up through the dirt from winter slumber. Suddenly, I heard the words, “Look for the pink flowers” so strongly in my head that I paused. The voice was distinctly God's. With all the clatter going on in my head, I almost kept walking. It would've been easier to ignore the voice, than to pause and possibly be late for my appointment. 

But I stopped and stood for a few minutes, looking at the tiny pink blooms that lay amongst the greening grass and remnants of autumn's leaves. Suddenly I understood what I was supposed to be doing for this fragment of life I have left. I am to look for the pink flowers, and encourage others to do the same. So many times what we experience are the grayed ashes of the fire that’s threatened to burn out our souls. A pandemic. War in Europe. Crises at the border. Poverty. Trafficking. Unemployment. Divorce. Division within the churches. Political screaming. Self-doubt. Infertility. So much more. 

And so, going forward, I will look for the pink flowers whenever life feels drab and sad, wicked and out of control. The world is stirring in wild ways, but the lens we see through is so much a choice. I was reminded of Viktor Frankl's ability to survive the Holocaust because he had hope - and the work that followed with his studies of logotherapy and human's quest to find meaning in life, which has deep spiritual connotations to it.  

Pink flowers are the metaphor, of course, for finding that bright spot of life within the tangle of old musty autumn-winter leaves that determine the fate of future life as they lay like big soppy bandages over yesterday’s beauty, disguising and smothering the essence of life. 

Pink flowers aren’t just pink flowers. They are the things that you personally pause to observe and experience. They are the small moments in life – the precious moment of the present – that bring joy, meaning and peace. They are the moments spent with an aging loved one, or the count down to graduation with a child who will soon leave for college. They are the moments spent with a friend who is about to undergo surgery, and then the restless time spent in the waiting room amongst the tears and fears of others. They are the moments lived when tomorrow is uncertain, but today is filled with opportunities for joy, sharing with others, and a gentle acceptance of whatever it is that threatens to bring doubt, fear and discontentment. 

Pink flowers are the crayons of our youth – the ones that scribble outside the lines in coloring books and the adventures that create tantrums on long summer nights when we’re forced to go to bed far earlier than we are ready. The pink flowers help us move forward, even when he grief of life tries to suffocate us. Look for them, these pink flowers, because they are there, scattered everywhere, along your path.

~ Suzette Mack

Update: I was not diagnosed with cancer. Such a relief. I hold fast to the promises of Christ, knowing God is the greatest healer of all, and that healing may not always come in the exact form we want - but it is there, amongst those pink flowers.