Blasted Cancer

This morning our friend, Bob, passed away. Cancer. Again.

Cancer sucks. I am sure you can agree. I think it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to find a person whose life has been untouched my this dreaded disease. My mother's sister, my beloved Aunt Lisa, was taken from us far too early. My grandmother followed in a little over 2 years and then Aunt Amy 6 short years later. Breast cancer. Damn cancer. I have two friends named Mike who lost their fathers to cancer when they were in their 20's. My neighbor's beautiful daughter, Chelsea, is recovering (and doing better every day) from her battle with cancer. She was 13 when diagnosed with a tumor at the base of her brain. A woman in my InfantSEE mom's council has a daughter who was diagnosed at 7 months with cancer behind her eye. Kim was 34 when she passed after battling a mysterious cancer that the doctors still don't know what really caused it. Jesse's godfather, Brian, lost his mother last Thanksgiving...

Now Bob. A quiet, unassuming man, humble, traditional, friendly, give-you-the-shirt-off-his-back kind of guy who enjoyed the birth of yet another grandchild in January - diagnosed out of the blue with pancreatic cancer and dead not even two months later. How fair is that? Is two months enough time to prepare? To fight? To resign yourself to the fact that your life is over? For his wonderful wife to become accustomed to knowing that her husband of more than 5 decades will be leaving her shortly, never to return? For his children to say goodbye to the strong father who is quickly fading? For his young grandchildren to build memories that will have to last them a lifetime? Two months.

Cancer sucks.