“I have a port,” I tell the woman at the front desk of the Cancertown lab, feeling a bit like a character in a spy novel.

“And I have a fine Madeira,” I imagine her replying while surreptitiously handing me some microfilm.”

I love this opening to a blog post written by Double Whammied. Click here to read more about what it feels like to enter the limbo land of post cancer, pre the rest of your life. Double Whammied does an excellent job of capturing the challenge of getting pushed out the other side of treatment, without so much as a graduation ceremony or a “you’re cleared to live out the rest of your days free of fear” pat on the back. For any of you who’ve experienced cancer, I think you can probably relate to her words and even if you haven’t, you might appreciate her quick wit and fantastic imagery.

This afternoon I am staring out into a grey and dark Vancouver day. Rain crashes onto the roof and I feel a bit homesick for the sunshine of San Francisco, and the bright and blustery fall days of New York and Toronto. It’s strange to be back home in Vancouver and yet be homeless (but that’s another post). For now, I am grateful to have friends and family who continue to offer me a roof over my head as I put together my massive Adventure of Hope.

As I type this, I am elbow deep in trying to create a compelling vision document for my not for profit idea (no pressure) with the hopes that a few of the top international volunteer organizations will want to partner with me on my upcoming trip around the world (still no pressure, right?) While I wrestle with text boxes and pdf formats, here’s another post I wrote on Hope, for a very dear friend of mine who is right now spending her days in palliative care watching her mother fade from this life and into the next.

If you are feeling a bit lost or short on hope, my wish for you is that you will keep holding on to that rope and believing you will make it out into the light.

“Have you ever experienced such intense sadness you couldn’t imagine ever feeling hopeful about ANYTHING again?

Maybe, like me, you once stood in the corner, gulping your champagne, at a New Year’s Eve party you wished you had skipped. While your friends laughed about a shared joke, you held the corner of a Santa Claus cocktail napkin up to your eye to catch a pregnant tear before it escaped and ruined your perfectly made-up (fake it until you make it) face…click here to read the rest of the post…