Red Pen

Haven't been by in a long time. However, through random events, I found myself at Jacque's blog two days ago. I was just thinking.....   and then I needed to see it....  I'm not sure why. It was still there, with the same farewell posts. A few people have posted as comments since then, but in the last year it has been hit by many spammers. I was going to post something about the rudeness of it all, but decided it just wasn't worth the effort.

Today at work, random events occurred. At lunch, there was a group downtown giving away Valentine's merchandise at the spin of a wheel. I won a two foot tall stuffed heart, complete with legs, eyes, and hands that say "I love you" and "This Much". It pretty much made my day. I came back and was super productive. I was just booking it through projects, delivered Justin's payment to the lawyer, deposited some money at the bank, and was all in all rocking the afternoon. At about 3pm, a friend came over and wordlessly sat in my cube. Wide-eyed, she stared at me and said "I have something to tell you" in a top secret voice. After a beat or two, she picked up a yellow sticky note pad and a red felt tip pen and began to write a few words. I was so excited. We don't usually gossip in a cruel way, but we talk about work things, and non-work things. Many are little nuggets about people past issues with other people. Some are juicy, some are just ridiculous. The latest bit of news was that they let two people go in another area, so I expected something similar and amazing. When she handed it over, I read

"I have breast cancer"


She's only had a biopsy and no pathology results yet, so we are both hopeful. But I couldn't help and think of the irony that I thought of Jacque just two days ago, and then this.  For the next hour after she left my cube, I kept staring at that red felt tip pen. It just seemed so . . . dirty, I guess. Offensive might be a better word, but definitely unlucky. I had the overwhelming urge to just throw it away. Instead, I put the sticky notes back in the tray, and put the red felt tip pen back in the utensil caddy. I even stirred them up a little so I wouldn't know which of the two red pens was the evil one. After all, it is just a pen.


Mom went to bed early, E always goes to bed early (and is on East Coast time), Justin is at work, and I couldn't confide my sorrow to my work friend. Only one other person outside of her small team knows. So I'm throwing it out into the universe, and turn around to refocus on the hope. Jacque was good at that, perhaps that's why I found my way back to her...