I Wish I Lived In A "Burger King World"

I wish I could have life my way! I wish God had looked at me and sang that old Burger King ditty:

"Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce. Special orders don't upset us. All we ask is that you let us serve it your way!"

What might that have sounded like coming from God's mouth to my ears?

Maybe "Hold the check-ups. Hold the cancer. Melanoma sure won't getcha. I'll just letcha live your life doing it your way!"

Whimsical. Fanciful. Prolific considering I've already blogged today. Not realistic, though.

It is, precisely, because I lived life my way that I'm in the fix I'm in. Oh, I'm in a good place with it right now. But I wish I had listened. I wish I had heeded the warnings, vocal and visual. I wish I hadn't thought I could do what I wanted and life/melanoma wouldn't catch up with me.

I wish I lived in a Burger King World complete with theme song.

But I live in the real world and real life doesn't work that way.

I live in a world where melanoma doesn't care how old or young, or what race or creed, or educational level or income tax bracket a person lives in. It doesn't care what your hopes and dreams are. It doesn't care what your priorities, morals, or values are. Gender isn't an issue for it either and neither is any lifestyle. It doesn't care what you've already got going on in your life or what other issues your body has. It doesn't care if you have a family history and is always happy to start a family history. It doesn't care what your finances look like. Or what kind of car you drive or political party you belong to. It doesn't care if you are far too young to be concerned with any of that. It doesn't care if it breaks hearts, ruins lives, and pokes holes into spiritual lives and makes our walk with God a bit bumpy. It doesn't care if you tan or not.

It doesn't care what toll it takes on your body and spirit. It doesn't care if it kills you or if you live a tortured life...and you may never have any more melanomas beyond that first one, but it will torture you nonetheless because you'll look at new spots with fear, apprehension, and suspicion. You'll be part of a medical system for life and melanoma won't care about that either.

It doesn't care that it forces us to exam our lives and re-evaluate our priorities and that can be painful. It doesn't care our age when we undertake that process.

But just like I don't live in a Burger King World, melanoma doesn't either. It can do a lot of damage. It can kill, ruin, and destroy and is always seeking fresh bodies and new people to try and bring down. It does its best. True.

But it can't exist like it would like to and like it would like us to believe. For it is limited. It can ruin and kill bodies but it cannot touch our souls. It can follow us to the ends of the earth and hound our days, but it cannot follow us beyond where this earth ends. And it cannot hound our eternity.

I don't live in a Burger King World and neither does melanoma.

For that, I am grateful.