The Lazy Cherub Enigma: Manchester (Re)United

Why do we travel? We travel to see new place and to have novel experiences. We travel to get out of our element and test our resolve. We travel to connect – to come back to those we’ve met before or to forge something more than we already have. Our hearts have space for infinite encounters and yet, all too often we never quite open ourselves to anything more than what we know. There is often an unwillingness to be open to something surprising – to allow the place you think will bring you one thing provide you with something altogether outside your whim. This is where we found ourselves as we left London and headed to Manchester. We left a city we expected to dazzle us but instead left us exhausted and desperate to move on. We came to Manchester to connect with old friends and got so much more than we ever imagined.

Manchester is a city all Canadians readily admit we only know two things about – it is the home of Manchester United and Air Transat offers cheap direct flights from Calgary. Manchester wasn’t a place we came to for the sites. We came to reconnect with old friends. The city was a waypoint in a journey. It was a time for celebration and new beginnings. Not the kind of new beginnings sought after in youth but the kind where what you are about to become is all the more significant. You realize with age and wisdom, you are stronger than you really are and softer than you really are.

We had no idea what to expect. Our friend Derek had been battling cancer for almost 2 years. What would this visit mean? The day we arrived was also D-Day for Derek – the day he had his appointment with the oncologist to find out if the treatments had worked. Never had I felt my timing to be so out of my control as it did now. Whatever news he received it would be our news as well and all of us would have to weather a life time in 4 short days.

The news was in fact good – the cancer was gone and now the process of healing could begin. Its funny how we think good news should automatically equate with good feelings. Even funnier when you think the news that one’s life has been saved should automatically suggest jubilation and glee. What we never understand is the weight one bears leading up to that moment. I don’t think we ever truly appreciate how hard it is to remain in a state of unknowing for an extended period of time. There is no place for acceptance because there are no markers to fix your resolve. It is always a constant battle between your body and your psyche. I think how trite the words “Keep positive” are in times like this. What are you to be positive about? What keeps you going when every day you wonder, “Am I to live or am I to die?” Which brings me back to the good news. All of us breathed deeply hearing it and promptly went to the place of “See, Derek? All is good! Now we can all rejoice!” People like to remind you that good news is better than bad – which it is. What everyone fails to understand is how for so long you balanced on a razor’s edge. Joy of any kind is a moot point. It isn’t that you don’t want to grab onto it and sing. It’s that it’s been so long you don’t remember how, anymore. Joy is not like riding a bicycle. It doesn’t just come back when the sun finally rises. It’s a slow and painful process back to a place of knowing again. Only this time you are not the same person. Which sucks because everyone around you thinks the all clear means in fact, you are.

In these moments we become aware of how deep our love is and how far into the well we will go to keep that love alive. There is the other side of cancer – the side of the partner who bears witness to the pain. They become all things while their other is not. We expect them to be all things because isn’t that what we do for those we love? Can any of us truly know sacrifice until we are called to make the ultimate sacrifice – that of ourselves for the sake of another? On the outside looking in we forget that there is more than one person fighting the fight. We often interpret the other’s caring and love as a sign of strength. We rarely acknowledge it for what it really is – a desperate need to survive and carry on. Those who take on the role of caring are often neglected by the rest. We openly admire them for their sacrifice while we secretly hide behind our shame. For truth be told, we rather they bear the burden so we can simply bear witness unshackled from grief. We are grateful to caregivers who care so deeply for those who cannot. But ask yourself: “Who fills their well once we have all watched it run dry?” Will it be you?

You come to a place and think in the beginning it is a place for a holiday and reprieve from your world. You get there and you realize that you are the holiday and the reprieve from the world. This is your reckoning – Life is not just about you. It never has been and it never will. For those of us with very large hearts this realization means all is right with the world. For in these moments we expand and our love becomes infinite. For those whose hearts are small or broken, it’s the realization you are not alone.

I am not entirely sure what we expected Manchester to be. I had not expected it to be the place where I would truly comprehend the significance of a second chance. It wasn’t the place I would have picked to learn the most about love. Yet this is the place where friendships last forever. This is the place where love is eternal and lives on and on at garden parties and karaoke nights. Manchester United isn’t just the name of a team. It is whom you become when surrounded by those you love – united forever because love never dies when there are show tunes to be sung, gin and tonics to be drank, and fairy lights flickering in the garden until dawn.

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