ON AT LEAST A HALF-DOZEN OCCASIONS over the past 30 years, one or more eminent physicians has said that, very likely, my daughter Kathryn was going to die soon. It started when she was nine and diagnosed with a form of bone cancer that had killed virtually every child in its path before it got to her.

Kathryn's options were either certain death or an experimental treatment which included amputating one of her legs and undergoing a regimen of painful chemotherapy that also might kill her.

She recently turned 40. Along the way from then to now have been a number of other nearly fatal events, all of them related to the original cancer and its treatment.

Today, professionally, Kathryn is considered one of the bright lights of her generation. The particulars don't matter for the purposes of this tale except to say that, as a visible and respected person, she is often told how courageous she is for having overcome so much adversity.

She says baloney.

"If God gave me the chance to live my life over without cancer and heart failure and being an amputee and all the rest, I wouldn't take it. Better hair, maybe. The rest, fuhgedaboutit."

I once heard a war correspondent remark that when the bullets first start flying in your direction, one of two things happens: You become a blob of pudding, or you develop a wicked sense of humor.

Kathryn might take that one step further and say there's also the choice to see the gift that accompanies those bullets - a teacher helping to bring forward parts of us we never knew were there.

Which reminds me, I have a poster more valuable than the Mona Lisa, and I'd be happy to give it to you. No joke.

The image on my poster, created by one of the delightful illustrators of our day, Jeff Moores, is of Noah waterskiing behind the ark. The man is most decidedly having a good time. It may be pouring rain, not a speck of land in sight, but Noah isn't fazed. He's having a ball. As are all the animals on board cheering his performance.

Under the image is the headline: Being Alive is Knowing How to Celebrate.

Why do I feel my poster is more valuable than Da Vinci's masterpiece (besides the possibility that I'm a nutcase)? Because it encourages us to ask ourselves: What will it take for me to celebrate in the face of adversity? That question contains a key to happiness. And, like all such questions, answering it requires courage.

That's because celebration - as I find it anyway - is so much more than a party, or a wing-ding to note an achievement. Celebration is not something we earn - like dessert after eating our peas. Celebration is actually the very essence of life. It's what we must do all the time to have the life we want.

Which is why true celebration can be as scary as it is rewarding, for it is the practice of honoring the sacredness of everything that has brought us to this moment - every experience we've ever had, frankly - then giving it away, freeing ourselves of it so that we may step into the present completely open to all that the present has to offer.

If all the holy books ever written were distilled to a half-dozen bumper stickers, Be Here Now would doubtless be one of them. Isn't that what we're all trying to accomplish: To be as fully present as possible?

How do we do that without bowing with reverence to every single part of us?

At the same time, how do we do it if we're carrying around the past like a backpack full of bowling balls? Or if our attention is perpetually around the next corner lest a fire-breathing Chihuahua be lurking there?

There are many reasons my daughter isn't dead yet. Three of them are medical wizardry, a wicked sense of humor, and the fact that you can celebrate just fine no matter how many legs you have.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Steve Roberts is the author of Cool Mind Warm Heart, a collection of essays, stories, and photographs of stone sculptures he builds on his Vermont farm. He can be found on the web at CoolMindWarmHeart.com and at TheHeartOfTheEarth.com.