Praying to the Smoke Detector

You may have been wondering what my relationship with God is after all this cancer stuff. 

Before all this, I didn't exactly pray so much as give gratitude every night. Thank you for my wonderful family. Thank you for the roof over my head and the food in my belly. Thank you for a good day today. Thank you for saving me with my writing. Thank you for another day sober. 

But that's kinda the same as praying, right? It's talking to God.

Now when I'm falling asleep in my dark room at night, I stare up at the green light on the smoke detector above my bed and pretend it is God watching me. Listening. 

So I pray. I pretend God is listening to every word and emotion in my mind as I say all the things I need to say. Things I didn't even know I needed to say, but that's another blog post. 

Naturally I went through the typical stages of grief, but I've added a new stage: begging. 

I am begging God for my life. Another ten years, another five years, another year, just get me through another Christmas with my family. Please.

When I'm staring up at that smoke detector, I imagine God listening to me as I try to show gratitude in the face of cancer, which seems extra important now when it's so easy to just sit there and scream at God that he's being nothing more than a cold-hearted dick: Thank you for my wonderful family who are doing so much to support me. Thank you for the beautiful new lakehouse I'm living in with my parents. Thank you for a good day today where I didn't cry. Thank you for my seventeen-year-old dog who knows I need her through this. Thank you for another day sober when it's really hard not to want to drink. 

And then I beg some more. Because that smoke detector knows things that I don't, and maybe that means I have a chance of living to see 2024.