I write today with a heavy, angry heart. Ovarian cancer snatched another wonderful life away yesterday leaving our community diminished and torn.

I have written many times about how fortunate I am to have so many friends and such strong family. I just never have had to worry about whether help would be there for me if I needed it. It just would be. No questions asked.

Lately I have drifted into an old, familiar, comforting pattern. I am starting to live as if I am going to live.

For those of you that watch “The Big C” on Showtime, you will remember the episode last season where Laura Linney, battling stage IV cancer and her friend Hugh Dancy, dying of same, are approached by a mugger with a gun. Instead of responding with the somber and expected fear, both patients burst out laughing and tell the assailant that he picked the wrong victims. They turn, still giggling, and leave the robber dumbfounded.

Him: So, uh, how are you. You know?

He: Pretty good.

Him: So, good?

He: Yeah. I guess. You know.

Him: Considering. Yeah…..And she?

He: Well…that’s. You know how it is.

Him: Hanging in there?

He: Yeah. I guess. Hard to say. What can you do?

Him: Right. You know. We can talk. About it. If you want.

I was 8-years-old when my mother took me to see “Love Story.” I had seen the book on her bedside table a few months earlier. And whenever the theme song came lilting through the radio, my sister and I would swoon, and pretend a formal, elegant dance, gliding through the kitchen in our footed pajamas until Mom scooted us out.