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A2-Wedmesday, September 17, 1980 - North Shore News

Courage to survive

Cancer.

A wild cell runs rampant, overwhelming those
tame cells which were just doing their job, and
the wild cell's triumph is the death of all.

Terry Fox’s run made us
all think about cancer, but
I've known about it since my
first year in school, when my
mother came home to tell us
that that’s what she had.

My mother was never all
that good at hiding her
feelings, and while “cancer”
was a meaniigiess word to
my little brother and me, we

could easily tell that Mom .

was scared. Really scared.

And of course that left us

Suddenly, there was an
awful lot of overly-loud talk
about Heaven, as if the aunts
and uncles and Mom herself
were trying to prepare us for
something unthinkable.

We clung to her. God,
how we clung to her.

Then they took her away
to hospital, and my brother
and I did nothing but pray
for the next-endless day. Our
knees got sore but we stayed
there.

TELLING HER STAFF TO CROSS the picket Ene, manager of North Vancouver's
Carolya Lawson opens the door for the majority of her employees, who had been declared essential workers and
were therefore unable to join the one-day “information” picket by workers secking a contract. Pictured teit to right
on the picket line are Sally Wilson, Anne Shicids and Bob Miller. (lan Smith photo)

Truck demolished
on Langdale ferry

- A camping trailer on the
ferry from Langdale to
Horseshoc Bay was
destroyed Sunday when a
propanc tank imside the
trailer exploded.

A B.C. Ferry spokesman
said the ferry Qucen of New
Westminster was 10 minutes
out out of Langdale when
they explosion occurred.

There were no injuries

and no other vehicles were
damaged.

Fire department and ferry
officials are investigating the

incident.

Pannaracion .

Large
Selaction
Perennial:

Plants.”

Heathers
o and
Ice Pansies

Holland.
Bulns
In Now

Many
Varieties
Groundcovers
and Junipers

Open; Wad,.Sunday
Closed Mon.-Tues.

Lynn Vatiey Rd
AtMin Hwy
North Van

985 1784

MAPLE LEAF GARDEN SPOTS

20th & Huywood
West Van
922? 28613

Finally, the word came
that she was going to be
coming home, but the tone
of voice was all wrong.

When she came home, an
the sidewalk. She had on
dark, dark = glasses.
Something — 2n unexpected
side-effect, maybe a slip of
the knife. But she was blind.

I was in Grade 1 and just
barely learning to spell, but
she wanted me to read the

I would sit on her lap and
read haltingly. And
sometimes she would even
laugh a bit.

We prayed a lot more and

Canada Employment Centre

her neck and she would have
to wear dark for the
rest of her life, but Mom was
alive and that was what
counted.

A decade passed before’

the cancer came back. This
time, the wild cells were
somewhere in her stomach.

quickly as before, but she
survived the operation, and

away one of her breasts.
And while she was still

healing from that — she's

over 60 now and the bealing

A ARG wo

is slow, slow, slow — cancer
invaded her intestines, and.
they had to go in after it.

My mother suffered.

And for a while there, her

im was too much for me to
bear and I began to wish she
could be released from this
incredible cycle of being cut
open and cut up and sewed
up and cut open again.

When existence begins to
become a seemingly endless
session in a torture chamber
— no matter how hygenic —
you have to wonder if it's
worth it. Don't you?

Well, my mother never
wondered.

If there were moments
when her will to live
faltered, I didn’t see them.
The courage we all saw in
Terry Fox is there in
everyone who decides to
fight to survive, and my
mother has that courage in
large amounts.

If she didn't have that
courage, she wouldn't have
been around this summer to
play with her latest grandson
— and to dance with me, one
more time.

SEYMOUR

are

4

Highta

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PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
We meet every Sunday at 9:30 A.M.
at the PLYMOUTH ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

(Tolicross Rd., just off Mt. Seymour Parkway).
CHURCH SCHOOL and NURSERY

PLEASE NOTE TIME CHANGE

RIVIERA SPA

Men, Women — Swim 7 Days a Week:

4 MONTHS FOR ‘80.

Fashion Story of the 80's.
from

100% Wool and camel suits. With matching
reversible plaid pleated and kilt skirts. Tcam
these up with velvet blazers in assortment of

Westiynn Mall

Lansdown Mall

But sometimes for

= long

COMMUNITY

provided

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aa Sook. |

985-7615
273-3550