I make a point of going down the stairs (which I do on my rear-end, slowly, step by step) at least once a day. I sit in my wheelchair and listen to opera because I have just realized how much I love it. I always liked it Even worked for the Boston Opera Theater, so this is nothing new to me, but the way it sounds now, the intense emotion it holds, touches me like never before. O Mio Babino Caro becomes my favorite. What little I remember from my surgery is waking up to this aria. That I heard a beautiful voice singing in Italian. But I can't confirm this. It may have been the drugs, or my desire, or both. Either way, I hear it, and now, I want to hear it all the time, so I put it on repeat and play it over and over. It is one of few things that makes me happy in those dark days. I sit in my wheelchair at the garden door and watch the coneflowers blow in the wind. One day, I see the soft grey-mauve of a storm front moving in; one of those humid, sultry summer storms with heavy rain, and yes it's corny, but I don't think I have ever seen anything so beautiful.

All these things I've taken for granted are suddenly alive. What a fool I've been. This, I am sure, is an experience common to all patients who suffer serious illness. Who come to that thin place that is the edge of death. But I did not die; I was saved. I was lost, but now I'm found. And I didn't even notice the one person who saved my life - not til later.

Later, when I could walk again, I saw my surgeon in his office. It was a routine check to see how the incision was healing and to get the results of my the lymph node biopsy. He looks kind to me. That's my first impression. He wears really nifty, well-tailored, peg-leg suits and a dark tie. Eventually, I will find out that almost all oncologists wear dark suits and ties, but I can tell you, none of them look as cool as David. And cool is the word. He looks like Maxwell Smart, only better looking. He has light-brown hair and freckles and big blue eyes. I remember the eyes from the OR. He speaks softly, and even the worst news is when it is delivered by him doesn't seem so bad. I begin to like him. He keeps me out of pain, he has saved my life. He has held my hand when I was frightened. He has returned every page. He has always been right there. Of all the people around me, he is the one person I think truly understands what is like to live in that thin place between the living and the dead, because that is where I live. Not dead, not quite alive. A thin place.