Surgery tomorrow

Dearest Jan, for those who can't appreciate the beauty in how your head looks these days they need to look more of Picaso's work or look at Linus' head from Peanuts' comics. I wondered what people think when they look at your head. Is it that is different? Is it that it shows how fragile our own heads can be? Is it that they marvel at whether the shape affects the functioning of your brain?

Maybe the surprise, or the discomfort people feel, has more to do with their own assumptions about how everything should look like, and when something is different from that perception, people make judgments and create distance, isolate themselves and the "others". This is similar to what people feel and think when they meet someone with a different skin color or a different accent, or a different shape. Racism is nothing but a perception about "us" and "them", discrimination is the way we act when we believe these perceptions.

The dent in your head made by the lack of flap bones on the left side of your head may isolate some that don't know what to do with their perception about it. To be honest, I don't even notice it. I focus on your face, on your eyes, on your mouth. Also, I notice that your friends take a glance at it and soon they forget about it; they are more interested in your soul, in your heart, in your thoughts. They connect with who you really are and don't get stick with the appearances. Isn't this wonderful? This is a concrete, practical, transformational result of love. They really love you Jan, and they go for the substance setting aside the form.

But all this will be history tomorrow morning. At 6am we have to be at Sunnybrook. At 7:30 you will have an operation to get your flap bones back in. Your head will look "normal" again. And that's that. Who you are remains unchanged.

Now people will look a the patch in your head while the scar heals. Well, they need to learn about the essential things in people. For those who love you, you will be the same Jan, only a bit more mature... And with a round head.

Keep walking on water dear Jan. Your life is a lesson on faith for many.

-Fede