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Making Myself Light

by Samantha Albert

One night in the grim jaws of nighttime thinking
I had premonitions of my imminent death
I pulled open my carefully organized files
And began to discard
pieces of my life
page by page
Why will I need a five pound guide to facilitation when I'm dead?
Off to the recycling bin!
Who will want to keep my university essays?
Into the wastebasket!
File after file, page after page
Was mercilessly discarded and recycled and deleted until I felt
Light and clean and purged.
I was ready.
My family would be free of the task
Of having to sift through my paper life.
Except...
I did not die
I lived
and soon I discovered
that I needed those things, that I had so blithely destroyed
And what was I to do now?
Darn.

In the early years of her illness, Samantha would have middle of the night attacks of morbidness during which she was convinced she would not live out the year. She often regretted some of the rash decisions made on those nights. Samantha is alive and kicking in Stratford, Canada with her husband and son. Her joy in creative writing led her to found Ultra Sounds: An Online Forum for Creative Exploration of the Cancer Experience www.ultra-sounds.org.