Relief is bittersweet...

I talked to my Mom yesterday and she told me my stepdad's MRI on Tuesday came back clean. No sign of growth. It was just a bad imbalance of his medication. Which is great news, but... it's not over. Mom says she knows it will eventually come back and I hate to think that but I know it too. The doctors say he's not out of the woods... and probably never will be. We keep praying and hoping. It's kind of something that you tuck into the deepest, darkest corner of your mind and hope to God that it never sees the light of day again. It makes me feel so helpless... what do you do when you can't just take the wrong out and throw it away? It hurts my heart...
I wish sometimes that I could just reach into his brain and make all of the bad cells just disappear. He could go back to normal, no more pain, no more confusion, and Mom would still have the person she loves and married. If I could just take it away...
Someone once told me, "We are but a ripple upon the surface." And I remember thinking, What surface? The surface of what? I think now it's the surface of life. We go through life making choices and sometimes having them made for us, never completely realizing, when it comes down to elementals, we have no control. We have no control over when we will die, or what tragic things happen or don't happen to us. My stepdad didn't want this, had never expected this, but it's there, big as life. My Mom didn't want to have this kind of heartbreak and turmoil, she didn't ask for it... but there it is. I know life isn't fair... it's a ruthless damn SOB that doesn't take no for an answer. It's just sometimes... it's hard to stomach. I want to be a wave, dammit, not just a ripple... but I guess life's pool is just too big to be a wave. I want my stepdad to be a wave, I don't want this silent ruthless cancer leeching the life out of him. There, though, is the bone of contention... it doesn't matter what I want. Elementals decide, not us. Life decides, not us. I hope, though, that we can make the ripple a little bigger if we try hard enough. God, I hope...