Letters, Lies, and Liberation…
Don’t you just love alliteration? I do. Letters…I’ve written my second Dear Staff letter about cancer…Last April when I wrote to the Goolsby staff, it was gut-wrenching. I was in the early stages of knowing I had cancer and knowing I was facing a lengthy ordeal. I remember how difficult it was to write that letter, tears streaming as I admitted it to myself, preparing to say publicly that I had cancer. Almost a year has gone by, and now I’ve written to the Harmon staff. I know some Harmon staff members knew about me. Some I told, and others heard. I started thinking about writing a letter to invite anyone on staff who might be interested to join Team Kulesza for the Race for the Cure walk on May 3rd. I asked Laura if people knew about me, and she responded in no uncertain terms, “They know.” I composed the letter and then went looking for appropriate paper on which to print it. I found the perfect paper. It had adults and children holding hands in a line, all facing out, looking as though they could be walking together. There was a line of the people across the top of the page and a line across the bottom. On Monday morning I put the letters in all of the mailboxes. Here’s the letter without the walking borders:
Dear Harmon Staff,
My family has formed a team, appropriately named, Team Kulesza to participate in the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure on May 3rd. If you’ve ever given any thought to helping a worthwhile cause, this is your chance. As so many of you already know, there’s hardly a family left untouched by cancer anymore. If you haven’t been exercising lately, you can sign up for just a 1K walk (that’s my speed, but I’m aspiring to the 5K). We want this to be a family day with all the kids, spouses, and others. We hope to all meet before the event and start the walk together on Fremont Street. If you’re interested and would like to join Team Kulesza, you can do so at: http://www.komensouthernnevada.org/. While you’re there, check out the cool team logo designed by Team Captain, Krista Kulesza, and her colleagues at MGMMirage Corporate Communications as well as my personal page, which is still under construction. Honestly, this is a first for me, so if you’ve never done this before either, we can figure it out together.
Although I’m hesitant to divulge my private thoughts to all of you, my personal history and continuing saga with cancer can be found on my blog (online journal) at: www.drdottie.com. At this point, I’ve had over 12,000 hits on my blog, with a message from as far away as New Zealand. It’s not really what I would call an easy read; it has over 75 entries and goes back to April, 2007. If reading it, however, convinces you to walk with us and help find a cure for cancer, all the better.
Thank you,
Dottie
Lies…In a way, I was living a lie at Harmon. I wasn’t really pretending that I was someone else, except for the part about being someone else with hair. It began to dawn on me toward the end of January that I’d been trying to prove something ever since I’d been at Harmon. I think I was trying to prove that I could get knocked down every three weeks from a chemo treatment, finish those and move on to 25 daily radiation treatments before going to school, do my demanding job as assistant principal, keep teaching my classes at UNLV, and barely miss any days of school. I suppose if that’s what I was doing, I was successful. Once I made it through all of that, I cut myself a break in February and took a couple of Fridays off just to have them off. It was somewhat like living a lie. I think it’s called equivocation. It’s not an outright lie; it’s just not telling the whole truth. I certainly have not been telling the whole truth since I went to Harmon. Liberation…I feel completely liberated now! Along with putting the letters in all the mailboxes on Monday, I put my wig on a shelf at home and started wearing hats to school. I’ve gotten many compliments, but even if I hadn’t, I feel so much better. Of course, I do have some hair now (ridiculously white); but at least there’s some hair to stick out from underneath the hats. I really couldn’t have gone wigless a few months ago when I was truly bald. I hope some Harmon staff members will join us for the walk, but it’s okay if they don’t. The acts of sending the truth-divulging letter and giving up the wig have set me free…to be me.
