Created for Those Who Suffer

The post title is from Tad Mosel's play All The Way Home and continues "especially those who cannot endure."

In 2004 my sister's best friend was diagnosed with stage not gonna make it breast cancer. I didn't know until I was diagnosed that the younger you are, the less chance of survival you have.

Stacy was 28. Stacy was going to die. Soon.

When Stacy was diagnosed I worked at the American Cancer Society.

I was going through my 7th surgery about the cancer I was fighting. I had a whole bunch of useless fucking statistics to hoist.

What I knew once more: I was going to live. Stacy was going to die.

I had no idea how to be there for her. Or my sister. How to be real. How to cope with the bizarreness of who lives and who dies.

My sister was suffering. Stacy was not. There is a difference between pain and suffering that the Buddhists can teach us and I am still learning. But Stacy already knew that and my sister soon would.

 My sister asked her what can I do? Stacy told her.

Help me tell my family I will die. Help me arrange my funeral the way I want it. The family were in shock and denial. Stacy and my sister melded their love with pragmatism.

My sister spoke to her parents. This is what I know. This is what Stacy wants. I will do her make-up for her casket. This is the outfit she wants to wear.

Stacy. 28 years old. Dying. The strongest person I had met until then. Until I knew my sister.

I wanted to honor Stacy's journey.

I'm an artist. I wanted to send her a card that expressed her strength. I looked and shopped.

And found nothing.

Get well. God will save you. Crosses, which are crap art. No. No.

I rescued Barbie dolls and used them to reimagine a world in which women mattered, but antithetically, fell in love with some high end fashion dolls.

I repurposed those dolls.

I spent one entire day photographing the dolls I had, those I knew enough about to resell at a profit, and those I would keep and make outfits for. Out of clothes I'd owned and loved. To express empathy for the journey.

This is the card I sent to Stacy. AND I WILL REMEMBER YOUR STRENGTH.

I will.

Another card was inspired by Barbara*  a woman I knew and, who in presentation I attended told her story about the doctor telling her she had 3 months to live. When she asked why would you tell me that, he said because I won't offer false hope.

She found another doctor in Texas who gave her enough hope to live to see her last Christmas with her children. 

There is an intense focus in specificity, a terminal diagnosis that cannot be understood and won't be felt until you or someone you love has that in their kit. It's a sense of your place in the universe. Small yet mighty.

The card art has Barbies. Collectible fashion dolls. Irrevalent in this context. But I love them, certainly the ones I kept. I didn't have dolls as a child, so I see the yearning in collecting as an adult.

The day I did the photography in the local park, I was frightened by a guy who popped out of the bushes. We stared at each other. He held up a cardboard image of Flat Stanley, the current GPS around the world photography image. Share an image.

Flat Stanley, I said.

Thank God you know that, he said. My niece made me do this.

That day I also crashed a mountain biker barrreling through my shoot. He was laughing too hard to stay astride.

I have these beautiful words I have honored all these years.

I made these images. Dressed this shoot. But it's iffy now. Doll collectors. Pffft.

Here I am. The writer. The artist. I want this out in the world. I think it matters.

I also photographed my great-gramdnother's and grandmother's teacups. And my grandmothers's and mother's gloves. And their pearls. And their handkerchiefs. Three generations.

 

Which art matches the words?

 I'm going to offer both. The art is subjective.

 The words are what matters most.

Addendum: Stacy was buried in the pink suit she told my sister she wanted to be buried in and the suit my sister told her parents to dress her in.