The Big 4-0

Today is my 40th birthday. Under most circumstances, this would be a big deal, a time to somberly reflect on my "youth" coming to an end and my smile and frown wrinkles becoming permanent facial fixtures.

HOWEVER...
1. There's nothing like cancer to make you grateful to be alive. Perhaps I'm not as grateful as I should be: I still struggle with feeling that my diagnosis is somehow unfair, as if I don't deserve it or something irrational like that. We Americals feel entitled to long, satisfactory lives! But then I take a step back and realize that I am blessed that my cancer was discovered early and that I have a good chance of leading a normal, healthy life after this ordeal.
2. Getting cancer at age 39 is a sure way to be told again and again how young you are! Doctors, nurses, friends, acquaintances, cancer survivors -- so many sigh and say, "But you are so young!"

But, really, cancer and its treatment feels like a crash course in aging. I mourn that my body is going to be losing parts and losing strength. I mourn that medications will put me prematurely into menopause. In my weakest moments, I feel as if a decade has been ripped from the middle of my life.
But, in my very weakest moments, I remember to meditate on Psalm 46 and again reach peace and a heaven-centered perspective.

 ¹ God is our refuge and strength,
   an ever-present help in trouble.
² Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
   and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
³ though its waters roar and foam
   and the mountains quake with their surging.
 ⁴ There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
   the holy place where the Most High dwells.
⁵ God is within her, she will not fall;
   God will help her at break of day.
⁶ Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
   he lifts his voice, the earth melts.
 ⁷ The LORD Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.
 ⁸ Come and see what the LORD has done,
   the desolations he has brought on the earth.
⁹ He makes wars cease
   to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
   he burns the shields with fire.
¹⁰ He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
   I will be exalted among the nations,
   I will be exalted in the earth.”
 ¹¹ The LORD Almighty is with us;
   the God of Jacob is our fortress.