Chapter 23: The Fascination of What's Difficult
Jacoba undergoes her mastectomy and chemotherapy. While at the hospital,
she has two visions. She wants to die, and it takes the entire circle to
sustain her while she's undergoing chemotherapy. After meeting her deceased
husband in another vision, she decides that she will live.
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The title is the first line of a poem by my favorite modern poet, William
Butler Yeats (1865–1939). The original title of this novel was also from
a poem by Yeats: “The land of fairy, where nobody gets old and godly and
grave….” This was obviously too long to be a good title.
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Not even the wisest physicians or researchers seem to understand why anyone
gets cancer. They know how, but not why. Genes mutate, cells go crazy,
it happens. The information on breast cancer and treatment were reviewed
and corrected by an M.D. who is a friend of mine. My first literary agent
is a breast cancer survivor and was in fact handling
The Breast Cancer Companion by Kathy LaTour when I was writing
this novel. I used some information from LaTour’s book.
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Dr. Gollum (ironically named after the critter in
Lord of the Rings) is another example of the indifferent medical
care that elderly women may receive, whereas Drs. Lin and Melton show that
most physicians do care. My purpose is not doctor-bashing, but I’ve seen
both kinds of care. Like Jacoba, I underwent surgery at
the St. Mary Medical Center. It’s an excellent hospital.
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The Golden Voyage is beautiful New Age music composed by Robert
Bearns. It was very popular.
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Jacoba’s first vision in the hospital is based on a photo I once saw of
author Deena Metzger, a breast cancer survivor who had a tattooed tree
on her scar.
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Jacoba’s second vision, the Black Goddess, echoes that goddess’s earlier
appearances. I saw the same goddess myself when I was hospitalized in 1992
after a day-long asthma attack. I later wrote about this apparition for
SageWoman magazine.
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R’Becca was a friend of mine who died of stomach cancer. Rosalie was another
friend who died of metastasized lung cancer. Other references are also
to real people, though I’ve changed most of their names.
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Verlea’s healing skills were shown in chapter 13. Here we learn that simply
saying the word “cancer” out loud is an opening to Jacoba’s healing process.
So is looking at the scar, especially when Jacoba sees that she does not
have a big hole in her chest where her breast used to be.
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I have met people who sincerely believe that we bring diseases like cancer
and AIDS into our lives to learn lessons. When I was an AIDS volunteer,
I saw people dying of diseases no human being should ever suffer. (In my
novel
Quicksilver Moon, a major character is a woman living with AIDS.)
Are these diseases and other catastrophes a negative manifestation of the
popular so-called Law of Attraction? Lessons we should learn? I don’t think
so. One of my first AIDS buddies died in 1987 or ’88 at St. Jude Hospital
in Fullerton. They took the best care of him they could, but in those days,
AIDS was an almost instant death sentence. I don’t even remember how many
friends I lost to AIDS. Another close friend died of Lou Gehrig's Disease.
It was awful, too.
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Honest and fair, etc. Quoted from the Girl Scout and Boy Scout Laws. Jacoba
kind of overdoes it here, but then she’s never said anything complimentary
about herself before. All of her children must have been Scouts.
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Try the healing circle where you give thanks the next time a friend of
yours is ill. If you haven’t seen
Rent yet, this is the time—there’s “No Day But Today.” (I think
I've seen it five times, plus I own the DVD of the movie and another DVD
of the closing night on Broadway.)
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The chess game in Jacoba’s vision/dream recalls the game played by Miranda
and Ferdinand in Shakespeare’s
The Tempest, a play about magic. Dermot, Jacoba’s dead husband,
was a professor of English Renaissance literature (my own Ph.D. major),
which makes his appearance in Elizabethan costume “realistic.”
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The two quatrains are from “The Passionate Shepherd to his Love” by Christopher
Marlowe and “The Nymph’s Reply to the Passionate Shepherd” by Sir Walter
Raleigh.
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Lorenzo’s speech, which Dermot recites, is from
The Merchant of Venice, Act V, scene 1. Its metaphysical meaning,
explained in the story, is widely recognized.
Discussion questions:
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How many friends do you have who are survivors of breast cancer or other
cancers? How did they—and you—cope with the effects of the surgery? The
chemotherapy? Issues of body image? Fear that the cancer will come back?
That every little ache or pain is the cancer coming back?
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Have you ever had to deal with the issue of blaming the victim? What is
your opinion of this tactic? How does the Law of Attraction work? Do we
really bring things, good and bad, into our lives? On purpose?
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How does the symbolism of the chess game work in this chapter? Hint: Chess
is symbolic warfare.
Copyright © 2011 by Barbara Ardinger, Ph.D. All rights reserved. Permission
granted to print this page of the
Secret Lives Reader’s Guide for personal use only.
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