My mate Marnie…

Last week was one hell of a week.

And when I say ‘hell’, I mean it in a truly heart-rending sense.  But I also mean it in a heart-filling sense too.  It included a flood (here, not a biggie but enough to cut us off for a couple of days), a plane flight to Brisbane, three days visiting a palliative care facility, one day that included a major surgery and the loss of a dear friend, five days in hospital and a funeral.

So bear with me, while I take you on a journey that involves friendship, words, dessert, tragedy and memories that will never fade.

It began two decades ago, give or take a year.  I was a photojournalist for a newspaper called ‘The Sunshine Coast Daily’, working in the Caloundra office.  Marnie arrived as a young reporter, a whole six years younger (that seems like so much when you are in your 20s!).  I remember that she was fresh and bouncy.  Bouncy brunette hair, bouncy personality.  Beautiful.  And bouncy.

She was also super sharp and very thorough – two of the most excellent tools in any journalist’s ‘tool kit’.  I remember never EVER having to worry about her copy, or whether she had explored all sides of a story enough to provide balance. (A concept which does appear lacking in much of our ‘online media news’ these days…but that’s another blog post for another day.)

She also had a brilliant smile and a seemingly easy-going manner. I say ‘seemingly’ because Marnie could always get through to where she knew she needed to be (for a story, for her career) without seeming to force anything, or upset anyone.  It was a unique and invaluable skill – certainly one I haven’t mastered!

After I moved to Brisbane (and pursued a career in government – or ‘the gravy train’ as one ex-workmate called it… I called it ‘decent money’) and Marnie headed to Sydney, we led seperate lives.  We bumped into each other on occasion, easily reverting to an unqualified cameraderie filled with endless laughter and our shared joy of a well-turned phrase, of the unequalled companionship of dogs, and of easygoing friendships.

We weren’t ‘besties’, but we were important cogs in each other’s worlds.

Then, just over two years ago, I got a phone call.  It was 12 months after I had been diagnosed with breast cancer… I had blogged my journey and many of my friends (near and far) followed along.  The caller this day was Marnie.  She too, found her world upside down in a doctor’s office. She too, had breast cancer.  Our cancers, despite being in the same location, were actually quite different.  I am always loathe to compare cancers, whenever anyone tells me they, too, have this dreaded disease.  Every cancer is different. Every person is different.  There are a thousand permutations for ‘what will work’ and what won’t.  And a whole lotta luck, and a whole lotta guesswork.

I (by some series of miracles) guessed right.  I can take no credit for my ‘currently cancer-free’ status.  Marnie? Marnie’s treatment (as advised by trusted doctors in Sydney) did not work.  We weren’t to know it back then, of course.  All we knew was that we were fighting an unseen beast.  Side-by-side, 2000km apart.

We talked conversations that few would understand (or frankly, want to be part of).  We spoke of oncologists, of radiation and mastectomies.  Of bad bedside manners.  Of dealing with the reactions of loved ones to our ‘news’.  We found common ground and empathy and support in each other.  From this horrible thing, grew something strong and beautiful.

We didn’t see each other much, but when we did, it was marvellous. Cherished.

I have particularly marvellous memories of one particular gathering – Marnie and I had met up earlier as we both visited Brisbane, on our own, to talk breast cancer.  Then, the next night, all that was carefully put to one side, as we celebrated her birthday along with that of fellow-ex-Daily-journo and dear friend-in-common Miranda.  It was a karaoke-and-bad-Chinese-food celebration – we sang (well they did) and laughed and drank champagne til we were asked to leave.

Miranda and Marnie, in full song!

A few months ago, Marnie’s close friends received an email – an email outlining (in a calm, considered tone) the reappearance of the cancer.  But not just in her breast.  Throughout her body – in her lungs, her bones, her brain.  In true Marnie fashion, she did her best to reassure, while stating facts.  This correspondence (and the emails that followed) was well-researched, even-handed, factual. Brave.  Histrionic-free. Very Marnie.

This selfie was taken after a breakfast out somewhere in Brisbane in May this year. As it was winter, I gave Marnie a huge incredibly soft dressing gown – I wanted her to feel my hugs when I wasn’t there.  600km is a long way away sometimes.

We had more phone calls and I did my level-best to match her incredible, resilient outlook.  We talked options.  We talked dogs. We talked life.

I talked Marnie into starting her own blog – she was a writer. And I thought she needed to write.  To scratch that itch that only writers know.  I convinced her that people would actually love to share her thoughts and insights.  I was right.

This is Marnie’s blog – it is funny, clever, mostly-upbeat, never-histrionic and beautifully written.  Very Marnie.  Read it when you have an hour or so.  You won’t regret it, I promise.

The blog name comes from Marnie’s love of food – she was an amazing cook, with cake-pops her particular specialty.

She wowed friends and delighted honorary nieces and nephews with her amazing creations.  She raised money – for the RSPCA (reflecting the passion she had for her darling fur babies) and for cancer charities.

Marnie’s mum died suddenly, unexpectedly, at the age of 44.  It wasn’t cancer, it was an aneurism.

Marnie wrote a blog post about it here.  She celebrated being older than her Mum – tragically, she would only surpass her in months, not years.

I knew Marnie’s time was limited – hell, everyone’s time is limited, Marnie just knew that deadline was a little clearer, a little closer, than most.  Two weekends ago, I cancelled my commitments – a speaking engagement, a bull sale, a birthday party – and flew to Brisbane three days earlier than planned.

I visited Marnie in St Vincents – a palliative care facility at Kangaroo Point.  It’s a mental hurdle, visiting a friend in such a place.  It’s not that this was my first encounter with dying.  But it was my first experience with a palliative facility – and the first time I witnessed a friend, one younger than me, facing this experience.  I took roses with me – three dozen, from me and her other friends from her newspaper days.

I should have known she would try her best to make it easy for me. Her sight was poor, but she knew our voices.  She smiled that Marnie smile, and chimed into conversations with pithy retorts or calm corrections if we recalled a story or name incorrectly.  She made it easy. For all of us visiting her.  And let me tell you, there were MANY MANY people there, in Marnie’s hospital-like room.  Hordes of family and friends all doing their best to lift her, make her feel cherished, right to the end.

It was actually pretty amazing.  I am so, so glad I chose to be there.  To get my ‘Marnie fix’.

I heard the news that we had lost her an hour before I went into surgery for a knee replacement, Tuesday morning.  It doesn’t matter how much you KNOW something like this is coming… it still feels like a Mack truck has hit you when it arrives.

My poor surgeon had to be reassured that it was NOT him, it was me, as they wheeled me, my face swollen with crying, into theatre.

Six days later, I was out of hospital, and here…

This incredible venue is Cloudland, in Brisbane. It’s a nightclub.  Marnie wanted something different to a church – something people wouldn’t expect.  Her friend Catherine, brother Sean and dad Bruce, made it happen.

And even though a nightclub sounds a million light-years from a church, this place is actually pretty awe-inspiring too…

You cannot see clearly here, but that massive window behind that greenery is actually also a waterfall… water cascading many metres, with the sun shining through it onto all gathered there to celebrate Marnie’s life.

It was city and nature and nightlife and spiritual all rolled in together…

This cupcake, sitting atop her coffin beside an vivid wreath of flowers, did me in.  I lost it before I’d even sat down.

The tributes were incredible, including:

• a slideshow featuring Marnie and that smile, from childhood right through, of happy moments with many of those gathered there;
• her brave Dad: ‘and now there are two‘;
• her brother, who shared their childhood and the recent, special trips they had taken together, creating more memories;
• her friend Catherine: ‘She was a storyteller … incredibly smart, had an amazing memory and had a natural talent for describing the wonderful and wickedly humorous.’
• another friend described her (earlier mentioned) ability to get her way, without upsetting anyone: ‘she was the water that finds it’s way through the rock, finding the path of least resistance and gradually wearing it down’
• the poem ‘The Dash’ featured at the front of her Order of Service:

“He noted that first came the date of birth
and spoke of the following date with tears,
but he said what mattered most of all
was the dash between those years.”

It was all poignant, sweet, perfectly heart-wrenching and heart-filling. Exhausting and uplifting all at once.

Hours later, as we reminisced, ate great finger food (of course) and drank, Sean came to us and implored: ‘there is $500 left on the bar from Marnie – let’s not disappoint her and waste it!’

And while I wasn’t in much shape to help (I did manage a scotch and two wines over an 8 hour period!), her friends and her brother did her proud.  We each took a couple of blooms from the wreath, and her memory and life were toasted enthusiastically, dozens of time, til that bar tab (and we) were spent.  I think it would have made her smile…

44 is way too young.  But the life Marnie lived in those 44 years?  That ‘dash‘ between those dates? Bursting at the seams, baby.

We never know how long we have, do we?  All we can ever do is use what we have now to live well.  Marnie reinforced that to me.  That and the importance of calm-in-the-face-of-adversity. She rocked the hell out of that.

With love…

I hope you enjoyed this (long!) wander through my Marnie memories … and I hope you take the time to read her beautiful blog… I know it’s a place I will visit whenever I want to be reminded of her voice.  And her attitude. And her desserts…