After the success I had finding a reiki practitioner through a referral on Facebook, I went back to find some meditation classes.
I received a reply from S, who runs a small yoga studio out of her home. I would describe her as a hippy, earthy type from England. She told me she had an autumn equinox meditation and sound bath event on the beach that she thought I may be interested in. It sounded lovely, and then she told me the date—September 25th. That was intriguing. That just happened to be the day I was supposed to see my oncologist. It sounded like a lovely coincidence, and a nice way to cap off a day that might be stressful.
A few days later, she messaged me again. This time she told me that she was also hosting a half day retreat in October focused on the throat chakra.
“Okay, what is happening?!” I said to my husband.
“First she has an event on the day of my oncology appointment, and now a throat chakra retreat?! That is literally what set me on this path.”
“You should go.”
“I don’t see how I can’t. I am starting to think this woman has been put in my path for a reason.”
So I signed up for both.
September 25th had finally arrived. My husband and I set off for my appointment. Half way to the destination, my phone rang. If you know me, you know I never answer my phone. My ringer is always on silent. I watched it ring, and then checked my voicemail afterwards, like a true geriatric millennial. It was then that I discovered that the day before my oncologist’s office had called to cancel my appointment.
“Hi there, this message is for Amanda. We have to cancel your appointment for tomorrow at 1pm. Please call and let us know you have received this message. We will call next week to reschedule.”
“What the fuck?!”
At first my husband was annoyed with me. I hadn’t checked my phone. I never answer it. We had both taken the day off for this. We ended up pivoting fast though. We veered off the highway, and went to buy plants for our fall planters.
I called back when I got home and may have been a bit passive aggressive since I was still annoyed. Annoyed that I couldn’t call back until I located their extension code. Annoyed that I had received a phone call, email and letter in the mail for this appointment, just for it to ultimately be cancelled. Annoyed that I would have had to pay them $50 if I had cancelled less than 24 hours before, but there were no ramifications for them. Lastly, I was annoyed to still not have any answers.
I did still have my beach meditation to look forward to. The weather was iffy that day, and it was decided 2 hours before that it would still be held on the beach.
45 minutes before I received an urgent message. The meditation event was being rescheduled due to an accident on the highway. It was showing as an hour drive from my house to the beach, when it should have only taken 17 minutes.
“What is going on today? Everything I was either anticipating, or looking forward to, has been cancelled.”
“I know, babe. It just is what it is. You will have to wait and see when they both get rescheduled for.”
The beach meditation got rescheduled first, for the following week. It ended up not being held on the beach due to a schedule conflict for the spot. I ended up going to that beach myself, that day, and meditating for some time.
As I headed over to S’s house, the new location for the event, I couldn’t help but wonder why she was crossing my path. When I arrived I met the woman who ran the sound bath portion, L, and another lady who would be joining us. It turned out it would just be the 2 of us participating since 6 others were unable to make the new date.
It was the most magical sound bath I had experienced. It almost felt like a private night, just for me. Under the stars on S’s deck, set amongst big, beautiful trees. We were tucked in with blankets sprinkled with essential oils, we were repositioned with bolsters, and it was just dreamy.
At one point, I felt S kneel behind me.
“It’s just my hands,” she whispered.
She gave me what felt like a scalp massage. There was something a little emotional about it for me. It felt motherly. A feeling I hadn’t had in the almost 14 years I had been without one.
I felt something shift in me slightly that night. A willingness to be more open. A tentative thought about maybe letting some people in, and not being afraid of disappointment. The last few years had been riddled with new friendships that were highly dramatic, and painful. So when S & L went to hug me after the sound bath concluded, and prefixed it with “We are huggers around here”, I hugged them back.
A few days later, I still hadn’t heard back from the oncologist’s office with a new appointment date. One of my occasional regulars, R came in that morning. R is a fierce old bird. In her 80’s, and a total no nonsense type. Months prior she had booked in with me by chance. Her usual RMT is a colleague of mine, but that particular day, she was in pain, and waitlisted herself for any of us. I had a cancellation, and gave her some relief, so she began seeing me. During that time, she told me about her thyroid cancer. She knew I had a nodule that led to an oncology appointment being booked.
“So how was your appointment?”
“It didn’t happen. He cancelled on me the day before.”
“You’re kidding! Listen Amanda, take down the name of my oncologist. He is world renowned, and he works out of Princess Margaret. He is the best of the best, and if he thinks he can help you, he will.”
I took what she said to heart, and I called my endocrinologist’s office after work and asked for the referral to be sent.
The next day they called me back to let me know the previous oncologist had called them with a rescheduling date—-October 23rd. My mother’s birthday. She would have been 70. I wasn’t sure if that was a sign, but I decided to wait and see if I heard from the other oncologist before making a decision. Once again, all I could do was wait.
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