If It's Not One Thing, It's Your Mothers~ Okay, this made me cry.
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The Banana River is a 31-mile lagoon system running between Cape Canaveral and Merritt Island in Brevard County, Florida. The river is home to redfish, catfish, ladyfish, bluefish, Spanish mackerel, mangrove snapper, and supports one of largest populations of alligators on the Atlantic Coast. I drove over the Banana River about 12 times in three days this past April shuttling myself between the Orlando Airport, Cocoa Beach, and my stepmother's hospital bed. I never saw any alligators, but I remember the clouds were the most enormous clouds I have ever seen.
There is a stoplight on the way to the Banana River marking the Patrick Air Force Base 5.8 miles from my moms' home in Cocoa Beach. This is the stoplight where my stepmother, Allison, proposed to my mother the day after DOMA died and they could finally make their 20 years together official in the eyes on the state. Four months later, they were married. Their wedding was the day after Allison's sister married her partner Sue and exactly seven months from this current April morning, where I sat at the very same stoplight replaying the events from the last two weeks.
It started the morning of Sunday March 23, 2014,with a text from my mom:
"Hi Baby, r u home?"
"Hi Mom. Yes. What's up?"
"Honey, we have family news. Can u call me?"
I called.
"Hi Mom."
"Is this an OK time?"
"Yes, what's going on?"
"The other day honey, well, the other day your other mother was gardening and her stomach was hurting."
"OK..."
"So we went to the emergency room."
"OK..."
"And they took her blood and well, she has cancer, honey."
"What?"
"It's ovarian. Stage 3."
"What?"
"I know, baby. What the fuck."
I spent the next six hours cleaning my apartment. I washed the windows (both sides), the moldings, floors, the closet, boxes in the closet, boxes inside the boxes of the closet, and did four loads of laundry. Cleaning was my natural reaction to the fear that came with the news. If everything was clean and orderly, then everything would be okay. If I rearranged the furniture 37 times and bleach-bombed the kitchen sink, then maybe this wouldn't be happening.
Please Read The Rest http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elizabeth-baudouin/if-its-not-one-thing-its-your-mothers_b_6284758.html?utm_hp_ref=gay-voices