(I didn’t write this, but since the one who did is some close kin of mine and I am rather fond of them, I thought I’d let it run in place of my post today. She seemed a bit bashful about including her name.)

Sitting at the front desk at the cancer lodge was a favorite job of ours. Seeing friends come and go during their weeks and months of treatment made it that way. Seeing their bravery and endurance left an indelible impression.

“Happy” walked into our lives one morning. He was a cowboy of sorts. It doesn’t really matter whether he wore a cowboy hat, or if it’s a figment of my imagination. He wears one in my mind, a slightly worn black one, set atop his grey hair. His throat and neck were burned a deep, purplish red, the skin, tissue paper thin and wrinkly. We knew nothing about him, except that he was taking radiation treatments, was a bit gruff and rough, and was always alone.

Sauntering by the desk on his way in or out, we’d often see him gulping something from a small medicine like bottle with an RX. “Codeine,” he’d rasp. His voice always rasped or whispered, thanks to the radiation on his neck and throat.

One day, while signing out of the building, he casually drawled that he was going out to play the lottery. We teased him by hinting that he could share his winnings. His cowboy boots clomped away in the distance, on the way to his hoped for good luck. During his stay, we heard of his “going to win the lottery” a lot.

We also loved him a lot.

Eventually, the day came when his treatments were finished and he could go home. He announced he was going uptown to collect his winnings of $40. We found him later, sitting in the library, writing on something spread out on the table in front of him. Noticing us in the room, he gave a jolt of surprise, quickly turned over whatever he was writing, and gruffly ordered, “Get out of here!”

We got out of there, a bit surprised.

Later he came and found us having our lunch. Huskily, he said a few words of farewell and handed us an envelope. As the clomp of his boots faded down the hall he turned around, flashed an ‘I Love You’ sign with his rough, weathered hand, and walked out into the autumn day.

We looked at each other, realizing the envelope was probably the same one he’d been writing on in the library. Inside was a card in which was scrawled-

“Thanks for being a friend. Happy”

Tucked inside the card‐ his win of $40.