“The tangling of so much cruelty and beauty has made of my life a strange, discordant landscape. It has left me with an awareness that haunts the edges of my vision – it can all be lost in a moment – but it’s also given me a jeweler’s eye. If I’m thinking about my illness – abstracted from its impact on the people around me – then the answer is: No, I would not reverse my diagnosis if I could. I would not take back what I suffered to gain this.”
