One of my favorite bloggers passed away today: Cathy Seipp.
Ms. Seipp fought the same type of lung cancer that killed my mother. They were diagnosed around the same time, it turns out, at the same stage; my mother had already succumbed to her cancer by the time Ms. Seipp started writing openly about her disease.
My mother, unlike Ms. Seipp, was a smoker; but I learned during her illness that half of all cases of that type occur in nonsmokers, and so no one could say that her tobacco use caused the disease. I shared Ms. Seipp's frustration with the stigma of lung cancer and the comparative publicity that, say, breast cancer gets. This post from 2005 says it well.
I didn't read Cathy's World every day, but would check in from time to time to catch up on her and see how she was doing. For some reason I never put her on my blogroll or bookmarks list --- I always clicked through from the VC link. Never met, exchanged email, or even commented that I remember. But especially after she started to write about her health, maybe because of my mother's illness, I wanted to check in with her. And always enjoyed her trenchant writing.
I’m proud to say I never wondered “Why me?” Because that’s philosophically incoherent. But I do have a list of people that I consider every now and then, thinking: Why not you instead?
She tended to go a few days between posts, so checking about every week seemed right.
For months after my mom passed away, I would suddenly think that I needed to give her a call, and then a beat would pass before remembering --- oh --- can't do that. I keep expecting at the back of my mind that if I click through to Cathy's World, after a few days have gone by, there'll be a new post from Cathy, letting us know how the funeral thing went, how she's adjusting to the afterlife. It'll fade, but it's strange nonetheless.
If you never read her, it's not too late --- her stuff is all still there. Daughter Maia has been posting updates for a few days. Spare them a thought and a prayer if you can.
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