Aimee

I know it’s been over 2 weeks now, but to me it seems like no time has passed. Time seems to have stopped.

With advanced cancer, there is usually a certainty of death, but you are also given the chance to prepare for it, in whatever way you can. But we didn’t get that option. Everything came so suddenly that I’m still reeling from it. Aimee and I always figured that there would be some point of no return, some news of cancer spreading to other organs, and then the doctors would give her a time frame. Then we could grieve together, discuss things, say goodbye.

But we had just received good news, the first good news we had gotten in all of her treatments. 10 percent reduction! It seemed something was finally working, and there seemed to be real hope. And then …

The way the doctor explained it, it was difficult to understand. While the cancer hadn’t spread to other organs, it had thoroughly ruined her lymphatic system. According to Dr. Atkins, she had something called a chylous effusion which was causing the build-up in her belly. When they removed that fluid from her, they discovered that it contained what he called “a week’s worth of calories.” Apparently, Aimee’s tumors had shrunk, but they had also hardened, cutting off the supply of nutrients to the rest of her body and dumping them in the abdomen. Ultimately, where the tumors were and how they had affected her made them and the damage they were causing inoperable. And giving her I.V. nutrients wouldn’t help either, because they would end up in the same place.

Still, the doctor had no definite time frame. A couple of weeks, days …. It seemed as soon as he said this, though, Aimee was on her way out. And at this point, she wasn’t really conscious. But I stayed up with her all night, and it wasn’t until early the next morning that the nurse said she could go at any moment. I had no idea it was going to be so soon, so quick, so sudden. Like a thief in the night. I held her in my arms until the last moment.


The amount of people who came to the wake and the funeral was amazing. There was a traffic jam at the wake, and the police had to come to direct traffic outside the funeral home. And I know there were even more who wanted to be there but were unable to. The outpouring of love and support was unbelievable. Thank you, each and every one, who prayed for Aimee, supported Aimee, loved Aimee.

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Aimee was the embodiment of the transcendentals: truth, beauty, and goodness. These aren't just the words of this poor philosophy student, who clumsily sticks to familiar jargon. Each one of the qualities was absolutely essential to the way that Aimee was. And she had the ability to draw people to her and bring out these qualities in them.

It was Aimee's mind that I fell in love with first. She had a real wisdom and insight, to see not only the whole and what was important, but the particulars that formed the whole. Not just her eye for details-- but her eye for which details mattered. I always told her she had such a sound mind. I know that sounds wrong, but I meant it in a stronger sense: the ability to set aside emotions and see what is truly good and act in accordance with it out of love for it. She was passionate, but her reasoning was never overtaken by or based upon her emotions. And her wisdom was most evident in her taste: she knew a good poem, a good novel, a good movie on a quick read. When we were engaged and I was in Texas, we'd spend hours reading poetry over the phone together, and like a sponge, I would absorb everything she'd have to say about Heaney, Frost, Yeats and all the others I could throw at her. She knew it, delighted in it, and was so happy to share what she could see.

Aimee always said she was never meant for a body-- usually after she did something clumsy. :) Although she had been graced with such a beautiful one. I loved to just look at her. And when she smiled, she had such a glowing presence that would cause anyone to fall in love with her. I loved her hair, and she jokingly would ask me if I would still love her if she lost it. And when she did finally lose her hair, she in fact was more beautiful. Perhaps because it was clearer that her beauty was rooted in something much more permanent.

Aimee was absolutely selfless. She got upset-- really upset-- when she had complained during Xavier's birth, which took more than 48 hours. Which she took no pain medication for, no epidurals-- nothing. She was afraid that any drugs would in some way harm the baby. And Xavier was born in what is known as the posterior position, which causes an intense amount of back pain throughout. But she was upset because she saw her suffering as her offering to God-- and she felt she failed in that offering (!) because she complained during his birth. Incidentally, Xavier's birth lasted from Easter Sunday night until early Tuesday Morning, while her last labor, the labor of dying, went from Sunday evening to early Wednesday morning. She did not complain about pain during her last days.

And she was the bravest person I ever knew. Never showed her fear and always faced her fears. All the medical procedures, all the needles and surgeries, she didn't blink once. She was tougher than nails. It truly was something you had to witness, the calm she showed in the face of everything that was frightening.

And she was the most grateful person I've ever known. I really don't think an hour went by in her life where she didn't say thank you-- and she always meant it. I used to tease her and call her the "thank you" bully. :)

And she was a great mother. It has been great to go back over the blog from the beginning until now. It reminds me of how much Aimee loved our kids, how much joy she took in playing with them, in mothering them, in simply being with them.

Virtue, it seems to me, is something that must be tested and will be tested. It must be put through a trial, must prove itself. Those who are truly wise, beautiful, good, brave, and loving will have those virtues tested, refined, and strengthened. That's how I try to make sense of her cancer and the suffering she endured. This battle was, in the classical sense, her aristeia. And she truly shined throughout.