"Okay, let's pretend."

This is how every Saturday morning starts. My daughter, the second her eyes open, without a care for anyone sleeping or what time it might be, right when the rosy fingertips of dawn appear, she is ready to play. Quick with a scenario, a character, already back-arched in her perfect kitten pose, we start being. 

Being something fun and full of life. Animated. 

But it was just a few weeks ago that I wasn't feeling so full of life. The word biopsy might do that to anyone, especially when you are still just waiting for the procedure to be scheduled, not to mention the grueling days waiting for the results. 

I remember the radiologist coming in after the ultrasound and saying 'biopsy.' Staring at the lights above me in the dimly lit exam room, with tears in my eyes and a heavy weight in my chest, I thought about my dad looking at those same kind of lights the day the doctor came in to tell him it was prostate cancer. And it was metastatic. I finally had a tiny taste of what he must have felt. 

And a sense of what Amber Van Vickle must've felt when she was told she had cancer and would one day succumb to it, with her children still young and the dire need for a mother's arms. Just like my Annabelle. 

For a short time, I lived with an unrelenting fear. There were waves of sadness, Rosaries prayed without ceasing, and the frantic internet searches that always seemed to confirm the worst. I cried out to God: would He save me from the plight I have covered so often in my work? I thought of Amber, of little Micah Kim, and the heroic virtue Senator Ben Sasse is showing the world as he battles a disease that will ultimately win. 

I may have spent my nights in the desert, but the days were so different. I have never played or worked with such intention. I remember one Saturday morning so vividly, my daughter ready to play Charlotte's Web, our favorite book. She was mastering her Templeton voice while I shifted between Wilbur, Charlotte, and the occasional Lurvy line. I was all in, running and bouncing around, building webs and a fort-barn, and fantasizing that this indeed was all there is, thanking the dear Lord for this moment because it may be one of my last. 

My brush with death was brief. I am profoundly grateful to God for the experience, and the other b-word, 'benign.' But as I continue along this Lent, I have been deeply touched by what I have learned through this entire ordeal.  And the fate of so many I know (and don't know) who were dealt the other diagnosis. I find myself not wanting to let go of this reality that we all must face especially as Catholics, looking death square in the eye. And not running away. 

Right now, the relics of St. Francis of Assisi are being venerated — a saint who was no stranger to profound physical suffering. At the end, he asked to be placed on the bare ground so he could die in poverty, welcoming "Sister Death" not as an enemy to be summoned early, but as a transition to be faced with grace. 

As he wrote in his Canticle of the Creatures:

“Praised be You, my Lord, through our Sister Bodily Death, from whom no one living can escape.”

Ultimately as Catholics, this is the mark of the Lenten season: Remember you are dust and to dust, you shall return. 

So pretend with me. Imagine our days are numbered and we only have this day or this year left. This is an invitation to intentionality, not a retreat from reality. 

The Register has been speaking to scholars on the age-old tradition of facing mortality like Dr. Lydia Dugdale. Charles Camosy, and others, but what's missing are more stories like this, so we want to hear from you. Have you experienced your own crosses or walked with someone carrying theirs? Please reach out to me ([email protected]) to share your own so we can continue to learn from each other. 

As we continue on these 40 days, let's remember our mortality and cling to the Christian hope found in any cross that comes our way, praying that we may learn to live and love like Christ.