Kewpies: My Cancer Coping Mascot

 

We have mascots for sports teams, mascots for businesses. But what about for Breast cancer?

I’m not talking about creating some weird blob-looking critter, uncomfortably named, “Tumie, the Tumor.” Yikes.

No, I’m talking about coming up with your own inanimate cheerleader, after you get that threatening Breast cancer news. I’m talking about something of such personal meaning and possibly, irreverence, that every single time you look at that sucker, you get to your own brand of feistiness and grit.

I realized mine, not long after a fun phone conversation.

“Hi, Sheryle. So, we have your biopsy results back and unfortunately, there is the presence of cancer…”

After a few intense, “I’m- dying- a- horrible- death- and- I- don’t- have- a- t-shirt- to- show- for- it” days, I saw a face pop up, a Kewpie doll face.

I was startled. I felt I was on the bad end of some word association gone wrong. When you say cancer, I say Kewpie? Really?

So, I tried to go back to my freaked out, “I’m dying” thoughts, and… boop! There it was again. That Kewpie face, following me around like the Teletubbies’ Sun Baby cooing and laughing as Laa-Laa, Dipsy, Tinky Winky and Po scampered along the hillside. That face was there as I made appointments, obsessed about Breast cancer, did laundry and wrote. This is harassment. I had a Kewpie doll stalker.

So, what was going on here? What was it about that face that kept hounding me?

Rose O’Neill, the author/illustrator of the whimsical little imps, from the start, gave them a distinctive look. Since their 1909 Ladies’ Home Journal debut, they have had that recognizable face: cherubic, with a slight smile and an adorable side-eye. O’Neill’s illustrations, through her Kewpies, were all about helping people to love and enjoy life. These winged babies were up to antics, getting involved in peoples’ daily activities, all to provoke those reactions.

Kewpie, indeed, helped me with my Breast cancer “activities.” As I went through all of my testing, surgery, radiation and seemingly, never-ending gauntlet of cancer-related appointments, that little punim got me through. The look of “I’ve just keyed your car”* proved helpful as I was poked, prodded, felt up, injected and traumatized by “medical expertise.” Likewise, Kewpie’s side-eye is just hooligan enough, as I now deal with my “survivorship.”

Coping. I know that there are techniques like meditation and yoga to calm and center someone who is diagnosed. Cancer Care also often employs visualization during recovery. Imagine a soothing meadow. Flowers. A beautiful ocean. And, that’s lovely, but I can’t sit still for those images to quiet me and meet my fussy nature where it’s at. But a Kewpie and it’s “you’ll never guess what I just did” face has gotten me through.

So, that’s what I encourage you to do. You don’t have to jump on the Kewpie train. But can you find some Talisman of your very own to help you get through your cancer paces? Who or what is your mascot?

Make it outrageous. Make it silly. Make it rebellious. As John Lennon once sang, “Whatever gets you through the night, it’s all right, it’s all right.”

Get yourself your own cancer coping mascot. It’s all right, it’s all right.

*(Author’s note: no cars have been harmed by Kewpies during the writing of this rant).

Copyright © 2020 by Sheryle Cruse