What Brings Me Joy

Cancer is only a new source of pain and yet another struggle to overcome.  I have dealt with severe chronic pain for decades now and thus, finding Joy each day is mandatory.  Without any source of light, the darkness would become overwhelming.

Beauty always has been a source of Joy for me.  Beauty in Nature, in Art, in Words and Literature, in Music, in contemplation of God and in living creatures... all of these can trigger an opening of emotional floodgates that bring ecstacy to my spirit.  There is a sense of renewed faith in the Universe, however fleeting.

In terms of a purely physical joy, that sense of total freedom from pain or any constraints, I always found this in Carousels.  Riding a painted horse, reaching for a gold ring, listening to that tinkling music that reminded one of music boxes and ice cream... it transported me to a place where I had no emotional scars, no fears, no burdens.  I am an individual who connects with symbols and the carousel holds so many powerful symbols for me.  The eternal circle is the most obvious, both in the movement of the carousel itself and in the gold ring.

I loved the sensation of movement, the wind blowing through my hair, and yet, I loved it more on a painted horse than a real one... partly this is because it is the place my father loved to take me, a place where magic ruled.  The horse was very real to me.  I gave her a name and whispered in her ear each time I saw her, gave her my affection and my dreams.  Even when I became older, I still had a residual belief in the magic of the Carousel.

The horse shown above was one of two horses of mine.  It all depended on two separate considerations: whether my horse and the Sea Monster behind it were free or not, as my sister always wanted to ride the Sea Monster.  Her other animal was the Lion behind my white horse.

This truly is one of the most magnificent carousels I have known... and it is the carousel of my childhood and throughout my youth, even my early 20s.

Although the horses and other animals that went up and down on their golden poles were beautiful, one could not try for the gold ring from an inside 'post'.  It was only when we rode on the outside that we could catch any of the rings.

We seldom missed.  We never were given pocket money so our chances for a second ride were based on our ability to catch the gold ring.  Quite a large number of iron rings were loaded into the arm that extended out towards the riders... Whether the operator loaded one or two gold rings depended on how many horses were occupied by riders.

One wonderful summer, there was a really cute young guy operating the carousel and he ALWAYS loaded two gold rings for us, irrespective of the number of other riders on the outside.  We rode again and again when that happened, because we never missed and there were rings for both of us.

When I was very young, no more than 6 or 7, I read a series of books about a carousel horse and her adventures.  I borrowed them from the public library in the town where my stepfather's parents lived and where we spent our summers.  I loved those books and yet I never have been able to find them as an adult.  No one else is familiar with them.  I have done various searches and never been able to find them.  I recall that the horse's name was Gigi.  That is all... no author's name.  I believe there were four books in the series.

This did not create my love of Carousels but it certainly strengthened it.  I think, apart from the magic itself and the beauty, the flash of light on the brass poles, the dizziness when one looks too closely and too long at the landscape flying by, there was a feeling of safety I never experienced anywhere else.  The horse was bound on a journey but it was one where the end was the beginning forever and ever.

They have used carousels in famous films, but usually in a negative context, in some sort of chase scene that involves criminals or a stalking scene that involves a intent to murder...  In a few films, lovers ride a carousel, and I do not particularly resonate to that either.  For me, it is the symbol of innocence, of joy that has no conditions nor limitations.

When my daughter was born, one of the first outings was to a Park with an antique carousel.  I had her in a little sling and she was less than a month old when I took her on her first carousel ride and, although it may be a little disturbing to contemplate, I reached for the gold ring and caught it!  She was kind of an amazing baby who seldom cried... she certainly appeared to enjoy the ride and in all honesty, there was no way that she could have flown out of the sling to join all of the discarded iron rings.

A Wonderful Young Writer deals with Life with Insight

Since I was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer, and my Mum was diagnosed with Stage 4 Lymphoma, the axis of my world tilted radically.  When I spoke of my anxiety levels, my Pain Management Doctor responded that, 'I would be worried if you were not experiencing major anxiety.  That would be abnormal,'    I knew everything had changed for me as soon as I received the results from the three biopsies they performed, but knowing about traumatic events and life-threatening diseases never are quite the same as experiencing them.  Furthermore, experiencing them NOW is quite different from experiencing a similar situation when I was quite young.

This is not my first experience with a life-threatening disease.  I almost died when I was in my early 20s and at that point, I became convinced I would not live to reach the age of 30.   I responded to THAT threat and trauma by deciding to 'live for the day'.  What was the point of planning for old age if one did not have that kind of timeline?   The fact that the medical profession did not even find the tumour and kept misdiagnosing my condition did not give me any confidence or faith in my survival.  A girl in her twenties is very different from a woman who have lived for decades, however.  I can remember that, on the night before my Law exams, I would sleep the untroubled slumber of a child... never stressed about the results, and indeed had no reason to do so.

I did survive beyond the age of 30 and I had a daughter, and the moment she was born, I became invested in this life and this world in a completely different way.  No longer could I even think of living for the day.  I had to be conscious of the potential effects upon my child of any move I wished to make.  I always believed that being a mother means putting the child first.  I may have made mistakes in the ways I tried to implement that, but she ALWAYS was first where any major decisions were concerned.

In any event, as I grew older, I began to be affected by very trivial worries, even before the Cancer manifested.  I do not know why... whether it is the effect of too many serious medical conditions that cannot be fixed and doom me to permanent disability or if it is something that accompanies age.  A sense of helplessness does foster anxiety.  We are victims of our past only if we do not struggle against those behaviour patterns that were engendered by our worst experiences.

I thought it was best to try to forget.  My daughter argues otherwise.  She believes in confrontation and I suppose, ultimately, the hope of a tangible victory.  I tried to bury the ghosts, and one ought to realise that ghosts never rest in the ground!

The solution to any problem, small or enormous, is to take back your own power.  The following was suggested to me.  One answers one of these questions every day:

This is the link to the soul-searching journal that I found very inspiring:

An Underdeveloped Story