I'm deep in life after cancer now;

it feels different, I feel different. It's hard to explain...

at Yom Kippur, I really felt the difference, in a surprising, wonderful way. I lead three services in a row and can have up to 70 kids in a service. A lot of them don't want to be there and I work hard to figure out a way to make the day meaningful for them. Usually this means creating skits and characters and all sorts of shtick. But this year, I hadn't put in hours and hours making props and costumes to teach the children about being helpful instead of hurtful, about forgiveness and letting go. I just spoke to them and prayed with them. When we prayed, for example, after the Barchu, for God who creates light and darkness and all things in the world, I told the children that light and darkness means what we see outside of us in nature, but also the light and darkness we feel inside of us, that was created by God, that is holy, those moments of us feeling the darkness. The kids were so with me and maybe something resonated in some of them.

In life after cancer, I am relying less on performing or entertaining; I am trusting more that my inner sense of strength will lead me through difficult, stressful, challenging moments.

In life after cancer, I am not expecting myself to be perfect at all; I can more easily say I'm sorry when I fuck up and then I let go of my mistake without obsessing about it.

In life after cancer I am seizing two hours after school every weekday when I am with the kids, 3:30--5:30pm, and I try to be on the phone or computer only if I have to be, and I make that time to be as present as I can with them, with what's happening in that moment. We've had some awesome times playing outside in these cooler autumn afternoons,

a kind of coming back to ourselves, of grounding, after whatever has happened in the day for us. For George, that could be lots of feelings that he can't express, all of the energies of the teachers and kids that he's been with all day, his own frustrations--

and so for two hours or so, I focus on being openhearted and it's been a kind of nourishing recovery time for all of us.

Some moments have been so beautiful like last Thursday afternoon when we stopped by our CSA to pick up our fruit share of Golden Delicious apples and the sky was strikingly blue with giant white clouds and the three of us held hands and ran up and down the big green hill in front of Kol Ami synagogue

and I felt overwhelmed with joy--to be alive, to be running hand and hand with my children, to be part supporting an organic farm, to celebrate Sukkot, to live in a neighborhood that we love.

I still have a shitload of things to do, projects to organize, finances to get in order, queries to send out.

Not a lot has shifted externally for me at all, even though I feel different in my own skin, now that my cancer is gone and

I imagine in the next few years, there will be profound external shifts. (Wouldn't there have to be? With all of this internal shifting happening?)

I am clarifying some really big dreams now.

The difference that I'm trying to describe, which is hard to describe, is the way I'm reaching out for my dreams. It's not my old way of getting over pumped on adrenaline and caffeine. I'm trying to go for balance, in just a day to day way, one hour at a time, more or less. Some days I feel much more balanced than others but my awareness is there, so when I become stressed or tired

I can more easily come back.

In life after cancer, I am happier. In life after cancer, I am more forgiving. In life after cancer, I am thousands of times more grateful and more present.

In life after cancer, I look different, with my GI Jane dark hair buzz cut growing in each day and my new piercings (nose and upper ear).

In life after cancer, each day opens and unfolds so imperfectly and I feel the holiness in it all.