rolling the dice

Things have been quiet around here lately. First, because things were going well and there wasn't much to report outside of work, which no one wants to hear about. Then, in a strange sequence of events that seems unbelievable even to me, despite being the one who's living it, everything got turned on its head.

One day last week, I was driving to work, circling the parking lot for an empty space as I do every week day. In the back lot, as far from the building as you can get and still be on the property, someone backed out of a parking space without looking first. He backed directly into the front driver side of my car, stopping before he did any real damage.

He was nice enough about it, very apologetic and asking if I was ok. The car is 14 years old and a little dinged up to begin with, and I couldn't actually see any new damage, so I told him not to worry about it. On the bright side, I got his parking space and didn't have to park in the overflow lot, taking the shuttle, and probably being late logging in.

On the walk from the far lot into the building, I called my dad to let him know what happened because the car and the insurance are both in his name. He wasn't concerned about the car at all, which was no surprise.

What he said next, however, has yet to fully sink in.

My freshman year in college, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. Hence the link in my side bar for donating mammograms to people who need them, based solely on the number of times people click the link. By the time she was diagnosed, the cancer had already metastasized and we were told she had two years to live. Nearly five years later, she was still going strong, and even went into remission. Until last week.

With the words "Your mother is taking radiation again," everything changed. From the way he was talking, she didn't have long to live. I haven't seen my family since Christmas, and was in the middle of planning a short trip to visit. He asked me to call back later to talk to my mother, so on my lunch break, that's exactly what I did.

She was very confused, saying things that just didn't add up. She was alternately saying that they think they caught it early enough that things would be ok, to saying things like "I'll see you in two weeks. If I live that long." She didn't tell me much, because she didn't really know what was going on yet either. She told me about the appointment she has on August 4th with her team of specialists to figure out what (if anything) can be done.

Last night The Captain and I were watching a movie entirely too late into the night, and afterwards, he went outside for his last smoke of the night, when he saw two police cars. In the driveway. With their lights on.

He came back inside to get me, and we went out front to see what was going on. Looking through the garage window, it looked like they were searching my car. All we could see was a small blue Dodge with the doors open, and full of cops. At this point, I stormed out the front door (the vicious guard dog never making a damn peep) to demand to see the warrant and kick them off the property.

They weren't searching my car. There was a car in the driveway that didn't belong there. At 2:45 in the morning.

We stood in the driveway waiting for them to approach us, since they were obviously busy. Eventually, two of the cops came over and said the guy they had in the back of one of the cars said this was his house, but couldn't tell them what the street address was. When they questioned him on it, he changed his story and suddenly decided the house belonged to a buddy of his, but couldn't give them a name.

The only description we were given of the guy (after I specifically asked) was that he was a "black man with a muslim sounding name." We told the cops that he didn't belong here, that everyone who did belong here was accounted for, and we had no idea who he might be. That was all the information they needed from us, and continued searching the car, which was ultimately towed from the driveway. All told, there were four police cars out front of the house, and one who drove past but didn't actually get out of his car.

By the time the car had been towed, and all the cop cars cleared out, it was nearly daybreak and I was profoundly grateful that I didn't have to get up in a few hours for work.

Mid-afternoon today, I called my mother to let her know that the birthday present I'd ordered for my dad (which he expressly forbade me from ordering) had arrived and I was going to set it up to play with it make sure it hadn't gotten broken in transit. Mom sounded much more lucid, so I decided to ask for a bit more info about her diagnosis.

She started telling me about the mask she wore for her radiation treatments, which set off red flags because they don't give radiation in the head for breast cancer, or at least, they hadn't before. When I questioned this, she told me that the cancer was in her brain this time. It was affecting her ability to walk, she was no longer allowed to drive, and was having difficulty eating.

She then asked me if I'd sit down with my 12 year old sister to find out how much of this she already knew and understood. And to see if I could convince her (the 12 year old) that being a colossal pain in the ass, just for the sake of being difficult is really unkosher right now.

After Mom's appointment on Monday, I'll know whether I can wait a week and a half to go visit as planned, or if I'll be taking a FMLA leave from work to go down immediately. This weekend is going to be a lot of sitting around, waiting for more bad news. Fortunately, I'll be working every day between now and when I find out about her prognosis. That'll help pass the time and give me a reason to get up and out the door, and do something productive with myself. My work schedule also changes (again) in the middle of all this which means changing my sleep cycle by a full 3-4 hours, so forgive me if I'm not all sunshine and roses early next week.