by Veronica de Pasquali
Yes, there is fear, but I’ve known fear before.
My heart, my head, my senses all taken over with fear because of cancer. I’ve lived that. I recognize it.
This fear is different.
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It is fear that one of my loved ones will be harmed in this pandemic.
It is fear that I can’t relieve their fears and somehow guide them through to the other side. I want to teach them how to keep going through the fear of imminent danger.
The Callanish community knows fear very well. The fear that we as a community have learned to harness and turn into a safe space that we hold for one another.
Our beautiful circles.
Our circles which have now turned into grids because we have to meet on Zoom.
Our hugs replaced by holding familiar smiling faces virtually in our phones and computers.
This beautiful grid of twenty people filled with the warmest open hearts.
Of all the fears and unknowns that we are facing during this pandemic, one of my biggest fears was the thought of not having this community that has kept me afloat for the past year.
However, knowing that we can still have our circles (which have turned into grids) and realizing with each zoom meeting that we can, in fact, continue to be tethered to each other, suddenly, if only for a while, has turned my fears into immense gratitude.
Gratitude for technology.
Gratitude for the grid on my phone.
But mostly, gratitude for every single one of your hearts
which I will hold tightly in my own heart...
Until our next grid, when we will meet again.
Veronica de Pasquali is just your average Venezuelan-born, French-raised and proudly Canadian Toronto girl living in the lower Mainland. Entered the cancer world in 2016 with a recurrence a year later. Thanks to the recommendation of her wonderful oncologist, she’s been a member of as many Callanish circles as possible since January 2019. She lives in White Rock with her wonderful Callanish participant husband, Neil.