I looked out my window the other night, and the moon was tiny. I could barely see it. It looked like, as my friend Kate says, God's fingernail. I stood for a while and  started at this little white sliver in the midnight blue sky. I feel a lot like her lately. The moon that is.

I haven't gotten out of my yoga pants for three days. And, I haven't been concerned much with regular showers and I have been eating Stouffer's macaroni and cheese off and on for weeks. I also have a dull aching pain under my right rib, that I have diagnosed as liver cancer. And I have also been obsessing about the fact that I am doing to die some day. Some might say that I am not in a good place. I would say I am just waning, like my friend the moon. She wanes and trusts. And then she waxes big, fully herself. And she gives all of herself to us. She lights our path at night, even with just a little fingernail of light.

To wax and wane is normal for the moon. Waxing and waning is a bit harder for me. When I wax, sometimes I lose perspective and get too big for my britches. And when I wane, I think I am dying. This evening I went to hear an acclaimed Buddhist monk from India speak. He smiled big and spoke in broken English to hundreds of people. At the end, with my heart beating fast, I stood up to ask a question. And I told him I am afraid to die. And I told him I was scared. And I asked him for help. And after the crowds had gone, I serendipitously bumped into him at the exit. His eyes even smiled. He was jolly in his saffron robe and red socks. He looked deeply into my eyes and compassion became real. And then he said in his way, "Death not scary.Do you know God?" My eyes filled, and I nodded. And he said to me, "When you die, you will sit next to God."  And he let out a big laugh as he waved his hand toward the sky.

I look forward to losing this battle I am in; trying to control whether or not I die, with worrying about it. It's not going to work. My friend the monk said to me, "Scary won't do anything for you. It's not good. Love more. And when you get scared, pray to your God." I want to learn how to wane. When I accept the ultimate waning, I will wax big, like the moon. And, rather than cling to it, I will know it as a phase of who I am, not as a permanent state of being. The waxing...and the waning.