It’s Day 51 on my journey and I’ve made it to Antigonish!
The people along the way have made this trip unforgetable.
How Do You Deal with the PTSD?
There’s a small tavern called Pitstop Burgers in Saint-Léonard, New Brunswick, a village of about 1,300 people.
We had only two reasons for going there: it was close to the campground where we planned to spend the night, and it was highly rated on Google.
As it turned out, those seemed to be the same two reasons everyone else was there: it was close to the highway and a couple of hotels—and it was highly rated on Google.
There were only three other customers when we arrived: an older couple sitting at a table beside another elderly man who was on his own. The three of them were already deep in a lively conversation.
I tease Deanna a lot about needing hearing aids because I have to repeat almost everything I say. Yet put her in a restaurant and she suddenly develops the hearing of a German shepherd. She can pick up a whispered conversation three tables away—especially if there’s even the faintest possibility of juicy gossip.
This time, though, the subject wasn’t gossip.
The couple was from New Hampshire, and they were telling the man, who was from Montreal, that most Americans hate Donald Trump as much as Canadians do.
That was enough for Deanna.
She joined the conversation.
Within half an hour, another couple had sat nearby and joined in. Our little dinner stop had somehow turned into a four-table international summit. Even more remarkably, the newest couple lived in Ottawa—just a few blocks from us.
The man from Montreal was simply stopping overnight in Saint-Léonard and had come in for a bite before turning in. As it happens, I may see him again on September 27 at the UCI Road World Championships in Montreal, where our son will be racing. Photography is his hobby, and he plans to be there shooting the race.
He’ll be easy to spot: a tall man with a magnificent head of shocking white hair. Deanna and I will be walking the circuit during the race, so I’ll keep an eye out for him.
The husband from New Hampshire dominated much of the conversation. He was 77, although he looked considerably younger than I do—which I found mildly irritating.
He was intense. Stylish, heavy-framed glasses made his dark eyes seem even more penetrating, and above them was a gleaming shaved dome. He openly expressed his jealousy of the Montrealer’s spectacular white hair.
He was also a retired member of the storied 101st Airborne Division, where he had served in the medical corps. He met his wife while posted in Germany, and she still has a beautiful German accent.
Their stories were fascinating.
His military experiences included Vietnam, Iraq and Mogadishu.
As I listened, one question kept coming back to me.
“How do you deal with the PTSD?” I finally asked.
I tried to imagine what his life must have been like: caring for so many young, strong and capable men and women who had been maimed, disfigured physically or psychologically, or killed outright.
How do you make sense of that?
How do you find any measure of meaning in it?
He was silent for a moment.
Then he looked intently at his wife.
Apparently, you don’t ever completely make sense of it.
He told me that you have to stay focused on the most important person in your life. On your family. And on being present—in the moment you have right now.
After everything he had seen and experienced, that was where he had landed.
Here’s to that.
The Two-Hour Shower
The next night I was at River Run, an RV park and campground. Deanna had left again, so I was back on my own for three days, once more hauling all my camping gear on the bike.
I was walking from my campsite toward the showers when a group of people called me over to join them on their deck.
Yes, a deck.
A large wooden deck.
Attached to a camper.
They were wonderfully friendly people, and my intended quick trip to the shower somehow turned into a couple of hours of stories, laughter, three shooters and a glass of whisky on ice roughly the size of a Tim Hortons XL coffee.
So much for the shower.
These wonderful people were all, like me, in what I’ve come to think of as the “Returning” stage of life—the time when perhaps the question shifts from What can I achieve? to What can I give back?
One of them, Ed, is himself a cancer survivor.
He is also the retired owner and operator of several funeral homes.
His best friend persuaded him to get involved in helping run the campground.
“You’re retired. Why not get involved here?”
Shortly afterward, that same friend died of cancer.
But Ed stayed.
Naturally, I had to ask him about his years in the funeral business—about dealing with people at some of the darkest and most painful moments of their lives.
Ed is tremendously empathetic and immediately lovable. He has an endless supply of jokes and funny stories, but underneath all that humour is something much simpler.
Caring.
Maybe that’s what his profession taught him.
Or perhaps that’s why he was so good at it in the first place.
Are You Guys from Around Here?
In Memramcook, New Brunswick, a sign announced that the road ahead was closed to everything but local traffic. This was a MAJOR problem in my route, meaning I would have to cycle many kilometers further. What were the possibilities.
I saw these two men who just pulled into an HomeHardware and I approached them asking if they were from around here.
Jean-Guy Leblanc, and his brother-in-law, Francis Leblanc (I kid you not about the last name…apparently 75% of the residences have the last name Leblanc) had a good laugh. Not only were they were from Memramcook, they were every bit a part of it.
Both the men are 76 years old and both are working until the “Good Lord” takes them away. Jean-Guy, wearing suspenders that look like measuring tapes, was as good humoured and comedic as if he had just come from a circus…he had me laughing from the moment I asked him the first question until I bid him farewell. I not only got all the details on why the road was closed and on the different options to get around the closure, but some great lessons on getting the most out of life. Not only did he have great humour, he had loads of compassion. Both he and his brother-in-law donated cash on the spot to ovarian cancer. ““`
That’s NOT the Point
On several occasions during this ride, people have asked me about Dianne and her battle with ovarian cancer.
Eventually, they ask:
“How old was she?”
“Eighty-two,” I’d respond.
And occasionally the response is something like:
“Oh, well…”
As though 82 somehow makes it okay that she died when she did.
As though reaching a certain age means death should become easier to accept. As though the value of a life gradually diminishes with every birthday until, eventually, we’re supposed to shrug and say:
Well, you have to die of something.
That misses the point entirely.
Dianne was a young 82.
Our mother lived to celebrate her 100th birthday. There was every reason for Dianne to imagine that she might have many good years ahead of her.
When I moved into her apartment during the final weeks of her life, she kept telling me:
“I have so much to do.”
And she did.
She had so much to live for.
She had plans. She wanted to travel. She wanted to spend time with friends and family. She wanted more dinners, more conversations, more laughter, more adventures.
She wanted to live.
So What Is the Point?
For far too many women, ovarian cancer is discovered only after it has already advanced.
That was Dianne’s story.
By the time her cancer was diagnosed, it was too late for treatment to make the difference we desperately wanted it to make.
And that brings me back to why I’m riding across this enormous country.
Why should this still be happening?
Why aren’t we better at finding ovarian cancer early enough to give more women a fighting chance?
Why haven’t we invested enough in the research that could change those outcomes?
These aren’t abstract questions to me anymore.
They have a name.
Dianne.
She should still be here.
Perhaps right now she would be sitting in Tuscany with some of her longtime friends, sipping a glass of wine, telling stories, laughing too loudly and planning wherever she was going next.
Instead, I’m riding across Canada without her.
And with every kilometre, I keep coming back to the same thought:
Dianne had more life to live.
So do thousands of other women.
That’s the point.
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I’m riding across Canada in memory of my sister Dianne and to help fight ovarian cancer. If you’d like to support the Ride for Di, please consider making a donation to Ovarian Cancer Canada. Every donation, large or small, helps make this journey more meaningful.
