My Normal Day

Today was a completely routine and normal day.  I woke up, got ready for work, stopped at Starbucks, and headed to the office.  It was a typical Monday filled with emails, a few phone calls, and teaching my weekly classes for work.  Today was October 8th.  I know this because I glanced at the display on my office phone multiple times today that has a digital clock and the date "10/8/12."  I also wrote the date on various notes throughout the day.  After I finished teaching my evening class, I returned to my office to finish a couple of things on my computer, and I turned on the radio to KSBJ in the background.  As I sat busily typing at my keyboard, the Kari Jobe song "Healer" started playing... the lyrics alone are moving for any cancer survivor, but for me the song is extremely significant because it was literally the first song on my playlist at every chemo treatment.  The song got me thinking about my cancer journey, and suddenly the tears started to flow with the song playing in the background as I again glanced at my office phone and it hit me... "Today is October 8th!!!"  It doesn't sound like an extraordinary date, but on 10/08/09 I sat in a chair at the oncologist's office with that Kari Jobe song playing in my headset as the nurse accessed my port for the first time and the infusion of toxic chemicals (chemo) began to enter my body... killing the cancer cells, and radically changing the landscape of my definition of "normal."  I couldn't believe that such a significant date in my cancer treatment and journey had suddenly be transformed into just another routine Monday... that if I had not heard the song on the radio, I most likely would have gone to bed tonight without it even dawning on me that it had been an anniversary date.  During the many steps of my treatment I tried to keep tough days in perspective by telling myself, "one day this will all be just a chapter in my past... something that I only think about occasionally"... and praise God Almighty that day has come!!!