How are we tracking time?

How many trips around the sun have brought us to this moment?

There is no way to calculate how may more of those revolutions are left.

So here we are. Still here. Here now. Only now.

I had a birthday on March 25.

If you know me well, you know that aging is very challenging for me. I do not want to get older. I need more time to become what I imagined, what I always dreamed of. One part of me sadly believes it is now too late––I have run out of time.  

If you know me well, you know I am very hard on myself. The feelings of failure I have about the trajectory of my life often takes me out––sending me into shock and a debilitating grief. How exactly did I get here? When I touch into this grief, it doesn’t feel like it belongs to me. The tears of my ancestral line pour though me, I feel the trees weeping, the sorrow that touches all humans seems to vine and intertwine with the fragile structure of my still standing skeleton.

If you know me well, then you have heard me say this before, I have a hard time being here.  

Still here.

I don’t like to disclose my age.

I am tracking time.

My son is 17.

My daughter is now 8.

My dad is going to be 80 in September. I never want to experience a time without him here on this earth with me. 

My kitten, Loki Lu is a little over 7 months old. He has been with us for 4 months.

I have lived in my current home in Seattle since 2009. That is a long time to be a renter, starting in my 30’s into 40’s, into. . .

I don’t like to disclose my age.

Time is more than a date. More than years. More than understanding the start or the end of a significant moment. Time is a moment. This moment.

Pause. Take three slow deep breaths.

Time evaporates.

Air. Oxygen. Lungs. Rest. Release.  

 

I was diagnosed with breast cancer at the end of July, 2023.

 

I have some good news.

 

This week, on April 16, I got a voice message from my surgeon. She informed me that my pathology came back from the surgery, and it was all negative.

What does this mean?

It means, there is no cancer detected in my body at this time!!

 

(you could stop ready here if you want,  as this is the most pertinent information)

 

I knew this call was coming, and honestly, I wasn’t sure what news I was going to receive. I had played out so many variations of what I might hear. But thankfully I didn’t hear what I feared––that the cancer was still there, or that it has spread to another part of my body.

Tears falling.

Relief.

Calls to my family, my close friends.

Now sharing this with you all that are reading. Thank you for following my journey.  

In an eight-month period, I learned I have cancer, and then I found out I am cancer free.

During this time. I turned another age. I made it this far. I am still here. It is a gift to be able to age.  

 

I kept this to myself mostly, but there were moments I wasn’t sure I would get another full rotation around the sun. I truly am not control of the timing, or when it is the end of my time, or anything for that matter.

 

If I have succeeded in anything in my life, it is this. I made it through this. I did. Despite fears that would creep in, I also deeply knew treatment was working and I felt my body getting to the other side of this.

Eight months is so short, and yet these eight months altered me in ways I have yet to really understand.

 

Slow exhale.

 

Eight months isn’t even the duration of my pregnancies, but I have certainly gestated something. If I can pinpoint it to anything it is ALL ABOUT LOVE.

 

Yesterday I had a final appointment with my surgeon, Dr. Cantrell.

She printed out my pathology report for me, and then took out her highlighting pen and marked each important phrase of the Final Diagnosis:

Negative for metastatic carcinoma

Negative for malignancy

Lymph node negative for metastatic carcinoma

No residual carcinoma identified after pre-surgical therapy

 Dr. Cantrell let me know how huge these results are, especially when it comes to triple negative breast cancer. I heard the seriousness in her voice when speaking these words to me in combination with a tone of joy and celebration. She said she really admired how I grieved along the way, as she has several patients that just want the cancer out of them so badly, they don’t feel anything until they are on the other side of surgery, and they see their body, and completely lose it.

I love this woman. She is so vibrant and wicked smart. I told her I had intended to bring her flowers, but I was running late. She told me her job is so fulfilling, she doesn’t feel she needs that kind of recognition. I didn’t want it to be my last appointment with her. I just wanted stay in the room with her and learn everything about her. How on earth does someone become a surgeon, how does she do this with young children, and she is young herself. Her works is so high pressure, and yet she is calm, an incredible listener, so humble, and so loving and empathetic?

It was just over two weeks ago, I reached out and held her hand in the operating room, right before the anesthesiologists said to me, “have a good sleep”.

The next thing I remember after my 4–5-hour long sleep is waking up to my mom, Lacy, and a nurse–– in a room that I can barely recall what it looked like, or where it was in the Kaiser building. Those several hours in post-op were a bit wild, confusing, and nauseating. It was a relief to get home that night and in the care of Hannah, Lacy and my mom.

I know Hannah informed you of my surgery and being out of surgery.

 

I also know that I haven’t given an update to where things are at for me for quite some time. I apologize for the long pause in communication.

After my last chemo treatment, I had several challenging weeks of not feeling so great. It would seem like when you are done with chemo and you have rung the bell, all should be good, right? No. Chemo is cumulative and I felt that, I still feel that. I was trashed, and having all kinds of challenging symptoms.

Soon after completing chemo on Feb 12, I was back at work mentoring students and producing the Cornish BFA Capstone show. They did an incredible job and it was a really inspiring set of works. Like many groups of students I teach, I adore them, and it has been the most challenging two years of teaching I have ever experienced.

 

(The last chemo treatment was a celebration of ringing bells, playing music, and dancing down the halls. My son joined in this moment, which was so special. Hannah, Lacy, Julie, Jjo, and Peggy welcomed me home that night with a structured  ritual, a hand off to each of them in different locations of my home where they read me poetry, did one-to-one performances, gave me a rose flower filled bath, food and dancing. It was so magic. I am in awe of them, of their care for me. THIS IS LOVE)

 

There is an interesting weaving of going through cancer treatment, while also dealing with the dysfunction, chaos, and heartbreak of Cornish, and what I am calling the “slow death of the dance department.” I have to be careful writing all of this in some way, but also this is my journal, my deep sharing of how this all runs parallel to having cancer.

I was a student at Cornish from 1996-1998, and received my BFA in dance there. Cornish brought me to Seattle.

I have taught at Cornish since 2005 in some capacity. In the last two years, I am now considered “more valid" in my role at Cornish since getting my graduate degree and becoming an Assistant Professor, but what I have given to this place is not based on my credentials. My work there has been my life line, it has been my creative center. It has given me the space to become a fierce educator, holder of space, ritual maker, generator, and compassionate advocate for young artists in finding their voice, their calling. Cornish, Kerry Hall has been the most consistent thing in my life since arriving to Seattle in 1996.

And now as I have been battling cancer and surviving cancer, I am witnessing this creative home to me, to so many, coming to some kind of end. There is much I have to say about Cornish and the current state of things there, but that is for another writing, yet there is an interconnectedness to my journey with cancer, to getting through it, while trying to survive my job, which is also my calling, which is also my failure, which is also so hard to be part of right now––being witness to this place I love, this place that is now just unsustainable and honestly not healthy. And with it all, there is still a love of teaching and creating. 

Let Fall

Is it TIME to step away?

 

Last thing about Cornish. I made a piece (with Hannah and several other collaborators) for Cornish Dance Theater, called:

This Has Only an Evanescent Effect | The Bodies I Once Was | Transfigured

If you are in Seattle this weekend, I would love for you to see this piece. I am not amazing at making works on a stage like my Cornish gurus, Wade and Deb, but I do like this work. And it does feel like a moment to come support not just me, but the Cornish College of the Arts dance department. See it in its collapse, its beauty, while it is still living.

 

Okay, back to surgery.

It has been hard for me to talk about the surgery, or even say out loud or in writing what kind of surgery I had.

I tried every angle to get out of this surgery. My medical team was so gracious and patient with me, as I really didn’t want to go through with this.

I presented my own version of how I thought my treatment should go. And they all listened to me and took me seriously as I repeated the same set of questions and arguments.

I was determined.

And yet, they also are determined, to keep me alive as long as possible––so my versions of a treatment plan didn’t really stand.

Nonetheless, I informed them, that while I will agree to go through with the surgery, I may end up getting there and then walking the fuck out.

As I was in pre-op, Dr. Cantrell came in to check on me to see if I had any final questions. I said to her, please remind me why I am doing this, that I am making the right choice here.

She did just that.

She reminded me (once again), my risks of reoccurring breast cancer are so high–– being that I have (had!) triple negative which quickly spreads to other parts of the body, and that I am BRCA1 positive.

So, despite desperately wanting to keep my breasts, I chose to give them up so I can stay here with you all, and so I hopefully don’t have to go through this again.

Here we are.

Still here.

The weekend before my surgery, Hannah and I gave an intimate performance to a small group of people on Vashon Island. This work is a seed of something we had been working on in one way or another while I was in treatment.

 

Not My Body

A rolling collage, an amalgamation of characters, an exploration of exposure, a shedding, a transformation, A deep letting go.

 || Writing prompts ||

 

This was me then. . .

 

 

 

This moment I am now. . .

 

 

 

I am becoming. . .

 

 

We intend to continue on with this work.

The next TIME, it will be with a new body.

 

 

I did a photo shoot the day before my surgery with Devin Munoz, who was a former student of mine at Cornish, and someone I have worked with now on several projects.

We had a really sweet time together doing this photo shoot. It meant a lot to share this time with her––she held space for me so lovingly. 

She sent me the photos yesterday. I love them. I love my breasts and my body. This is coming from someone, me, that has spent most of her life having a very complicated/destructive relationship with her body. So cliché, but we really don’t know what we have until it is gone. I am so blessed I was able to have them for so long, to be able to breast feed my babies, to feel sexy, free to be naked, and to move with my spine, my chest, my ribs, my heart in ways that are very unique to how I dance and inhabit my body.

God Is Change

 

I am still fresh out of surgery, and dealing with much discomfort, the immobility of my arm movement, and knowing I have many weeks still of recovery.

 

A former student sent to the book: The Cancer Journals by Audre Lorde.

Lorde writes about her experience with breast cancer when she was in her 40’s in the 1970s.

Reading this book offered me insight and much needed perspectives on having breast cancer. She spoke about the fears that come with having cancer and she uses language that gets at the grit, the horror and the surrender that should not be silenced, but voiced. She names that losing a breast is an amputation, and a huge loss. I have needed to hear it named in this way.  

For me the loss of my breasts does feel like an amputation. Violent and extreme.

I am a femme queer woman that loves the body with breasts. So, this change to my body is not gender affirming for me, however I know that it is life affirming.

 

It is going to give me more. . .

 

Time.

 

I choose life.

 

 

So much feels huge right now.

 

The changes to my body.

 

The news that I am cancer free.

 

The unknowns of my job and my career, my creative path, how I will dance again. 

 

I still have several months ahead of recovery, more procedures, and follow-ups. There are steps to be taken to ensure I stay cancer free. 

 

There will be a lot to process and feel.

 

I still can’t believe any of this has happened, and I am also now tuned into how many people go through this. I am not alone in this experience.

 

I am so beyond grateful for the love and support I have received. It truly is a miracle.

 

From the vastness of my heart, thank you for being with me though this, 

~Alia