The Crushing Paradox of February

I go about my regular day. Changing diapers. Talking about the virtues of simplifying fractions with Cee. Reading Quick as a Cricket 3 times in a row to Mateo. Scrambling eggs. Breaking up a fight about something ridiculous. Reminding someone to both flush AND wash hands. Every time.

Nothing has changed. And yet– everything has changed.

I still have to load the dishwasher. Get up to feed Pio in the night. Explain why the letter “a” has multiple sounds. But the movie soundtrack of my life is different. Something classical with sufficient sad notes on the violin to make sure the audience knows what’s coming. I’d call the piece, “Something is Brewing.” It never lets up, the violins threatening to swell emotionally at any moment.

The new treatment for my dad’s cancer starts in February. It offers the bittersweet hope of remission and dread of potential side effects.

The start of the new treatment can’t come soon enough, and yet it’s coming too fast. I want to squeeze in one more birthday party. One more Christmas. One more useful shelf. One more play-by-play of a movie. Just one more Egg McRandy. There isn’t enough time.

February, I hate you. You are IV poles in a small room. You are nausea, fatigue, and sleepless nights from all the drugs and ports and test results. You are baldness and boredom and isolation and neuropathy.

But I need you, too, February. You are the promise of tomorrows and next years. You are plans and dreams and a gaggle of grandbabies to watch grow and learn.

February, I need you to come through for us. I hope that you will be the month we look back on, knowing it was the dark before the dawn. You are the month of love, February, and if you just give us this one thing, we’ll love you forever.

Just this one thing.

Checking math is tough these days. I add up a column of fractions three times because I keep losing my train of thought. Guess I should have splurged for that teacher’s guide. The car is always good for some tears, either because it’s a quiet place to think, or because the radio is playing something that speaks to my life right now.

Our hope is in the Lord. God has a plan. I can know all of that with my head, but my heart doesn’t care. Because sometimes God’s plans don’t line up with mine. And that hurts. And my heart is not ready for that sort of hurt today. Or tomorrow. Or ever.

And yet– for all this February suffering, it’s also a gift.

I *do* have time. I have time to say the things that need to be said. To remember good times together. To never miss a chance for a visit. I have the gift of no regrets. However you end up, February, my eyes are open. There are no surprises.

Really, February, you’re just life under a microscope. You magnified the conundrum of humanity 10,000 times. Every day we’re faced with how “live like you were dying” actually plays out. Do we skip spelling lists and sweeping and spaghetti, opting to have a pillow fight and stay up late telling stories? Because that will make tomorrow reeeeeeeally hard. But if we always choose the dishes over fixing a puzzle? Not super great. Where’s the balance?

Oh, February. You are a month of paradoxes. I’m not sure whether we’ll be friends after this or not. Only God knows.

God knows. He knows how if you do life right, it ends up hurting. If you love someone deeply, even just the thought of letting go is unbearable. God is strong enough to bear my sorrow. My honest thoughts. My own personal psalm of lamentations. He knows.

I don’t understand.
How did we get here? How can this be part of Your plan?
Fix it. Just fix it now.
Please. Please. Please.
Let this cup pass.
Please.
Please let this treatment work.
Please let my parents kiss at my children’s wedding receptions.
Let them get older and wrinklier as they argue about so-and-so’s younger sister’s name.
Please.
But not my will, but Yours.

Like a toddler asking for a snack before dinner, I will not give up. I will keep asking. I will offer all the Masses, pray all the novenas, and ask all my friends to pray, too. Maybe even strangers.

As much as I don’t understand, I do. That’s the reality of February and Calvalry. They make no earthly sense. But they matter. Somehow. That’s how trust works. Faith. Love. All of it.

Am I crazy person who talks to months and God? I guess so. It’s February.

Please keep my parents, my siblings, and my little family in your prayers. February is going to be A Month for us.