You know, I used to be funnier…

This is not the post I was originally going to write.

I was going to relate the feelings of loss that I’ve experienced. And if I feel them, cancer sufferers who are in worse situations are hit with a tenfold intensity.

However, I decided against that. As I noted earlier, attitude influences our perceptions of a situation. That’s certainly not earthshaking news, but the extent to which that happens constantly smacks me upside the head.

There are bright spots in cancer. My Nurse Navigator, herself a triple-negative breast cancer survivor, would say, “You’re gonna either laugh or cry,” and as patients we do find things to laugh about. It’s just that we want to be the ones to point those things out. Calling yourself Yoda because you have a few long hairs on your head can be done in a light-hearted way. Having your neighbor laugh at your bald pate after a strong gust of wind rips your head scarf off, not so cool.

Sitting down and plunking out a humorous piece used to be really easy. There were so many things in life to laugh about, and it was no sweat to find the funny in everything. But it’s a harder squeeze now with cancer in my rear view mirror.

Not that I want to hide behind doors in Groucho glasses ready to nail people with seltzer water. But being able to generate a little bit of lightness would be appreciated. And when you throw financial stressors, cancer, work pressures and gradually dissipating self-esteem into that environment, pulling out a sincerely funny post seems almost impossible.

This is not how I want to go out, as the grumpy old lady who sits by the window all day, watching the kids in the neighborhood and ratting them out for the smallest infraction. No, I’d rather be the fun old lady who brings out popsicles and water balloons and gets in trouble along with those kids.

Same old lady. Different attitude. Yeah, I can swing that.