Cancer is no joke

Get it? Randy’s daughter gave him fake eyebrows to replace his if they fell off because of chemo drugs. We tried to use our family’s dark sense of humor where possible - what else can you do? When Randy didn’t want to do something he would make a fake pathetic face and say, I don’t want to - I have brain cancer. Or in the grocery store I would tell him that we should cut to the front of the line by telling everyone he has brain cancer. But it wasn’t funny and it wasn’t fun and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, and I don’t like to think about the end - it was truly awful.

Speaking of which, Rosalynn Carter recently died and an intrepid photographer got a photo of Jimmy Carter at the funeral. Worse, some intrepid editor published it. In the photo Carter is wearing a suit and sitting in a wheelchair, but his mouth is a gaping O, presumably because he can’t close it, because he has CANCER goddammit, and he doesn’t have long to live.

And every one of us who has seen that look on the face of a loved one thanks that photographer and that editor for reminding us of one of the worst periods of our lives.