Sparklers in the Backyard, Two Years After Diagnosis
Last night we lit a sparkler in the backyard. My son held it with two hands. He was wearing his pajamas. He was barefoot. He had a small piece of watermelon in the other hand that he had forgotten about.
He was wide-eyed. He was a little nervous about the noise. He was very serious about the sparkler.
We did this last year too. Last year he was on chemo. He held the sparkler from inside the kitchen while my husband held it out the back door, because he was neutropenic and we were not letting him close to anything that could possibly burn him.
Two years ago, we did not light sparklers. He was a few months post-diagnosis. The whole family was inside. The fireworks at the nearby park made the windows shake and my son cried in our bed.
This year he is in the backyard.
I am not writing this to make any large point. I just wanted to write down that last night, on a Wednesday in early July, a small boy who once spent the 4th of July inside a quiet house because his immune system could not handle the world, was standing in the grass holding a sparkler.
The sparkler lasted about thirty seconds. He watched the whole thing. When it went out he said, "Again?"
We did it again.
Happy 4th, from our family to yours.
Dina
Mom of Max | Founder, Maxwell’s Toy Shoppe
Childhood Cancer Advocate 💛
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