He has what???!!!

Today one of my seventh grade students told me her dad has brain cancer. She said it in a rather matter-of-fact way, obviously thinking I already knew. I didn't. I was not happy... how had I missed such a valuable insight into this young girl's life? I thought over the previous semester, hoping I wouldn't remember any emails complaining about anything to her parents, hoping I had not missed a significant cue from her mother while chatting somewhere on a field trip, hoping my evident shock wouldn't hurt this child's feelings. She told me that she thought I knew; she thought everyone knew. There are some things that don't get communicated or when they do, they don't really mean anything because we don't know who the people mentioned are. (Yep, the other junior high teachers didn't know either!) I think that's what must have happened here; we were probably told but since we are on the upper level of the school, we didn't know the student whose father was so sick. She told me this afternoon that she was going home with a friend because her mom was taking her dad for an MRI. He's having seizures. Oh my.... what else don't I know? She is so sweet and young, much too young to imagine what is going to happen if God doesn't intervene. So I have another reason to count my blessings. She and I shared stories about cancer hospitals; she had been in several with her dad and I had become super familiar with one in Texas while my husband received treatment over a five-year period. She talked about the hot chocolate that her mom bought her - that wasn't hot - until she pressed a button on the jar and it heated up! That sounded kind of cool. I mean, if someone can invent something that heats up chocolate milk without a stove, maybe they know how to fix a young father's brain so he can be a part of his daughter's life - or - maybe not. Sadness...