Saying Goodbye to a Friend and a Season
This weekend and week have been emotionally tough for me. When I was diagnosed, a couple of friends reached out to Jason saying they knew of someone who has the same cancer. I was reluctant to reach out, but this guy called us. What a gift that first conversation (and subsequent relationship) turned out to be! Steve Baker has been a rock for me through this cancer journey. For reasons I will not know on this side of heaven, he went to be with Jesus on Thursday night.
Our first conversation when he called, we were pulling out of the driveway to have a getaway couple of days in the mountains. It was my 4th day of taking Tagrisso, the magic pill from last year. We talked on speakerphone together for as much of the drive as we could until getting into the mountains. Steve was the first hopeful person I talked to about my diagnosis with real information about what I was facing.
Steve was diagnosed with lung adenocarcinoma a year before me, and he had been on Tagrisso about a year when we first talked. Later that spring we spent an evening with him, the only time I met him in person. Mostly we texted and talked on the phone, sometimes with Jason, twice with his wife, but mostly just the 2 of us. I had a million questions, most of which he couldn’t answer for me but he consistently offered what he had. He spoke so much hope and optimism into my situation, he always asked about Jason and the boys, and he always said that he and his wife were praying for me. I don’t know exactly how old he was, how long he was married, how many brothers he has (it’s 5 or 6, a lot!) what his friendships looked like, I don’t think I remember his face well enough that I could point him out in a lineup…so many things I know about good friends. But I had a friendship with him this past year that was so very helpful, stabilizing in a world of chaos, fear and uncertainties. Many people have been very stabilizing, but it was wonderful that he was so available to ask about scans and chemo side effects and effusions and drugs and the world I sometimes feel lonely and also submerged in. We shared treatments and trials we heard about. During our last phone conversation, we talked about heaven and what it must be like, what we will miss out on (but not miss!) when we are no longer on earth. It really was a treasure to follow him chronologically on this path, and I am so very thankful for the time I had to get to know him. I wish the time lasted longer. I wish I had that friendship back here on earth, but he is not wishing for the same! Here on earth, I am sad, but he has all the answers to the questions we asked over the months. I feel relief for him.
