On the train ride home from Toronto today, I finished Kate Bowler's memoir No Cure For Being Human (And Other Truths I Need to Hear). This evening, back at home in my own bed, I did something I hadn't done in years: I pulled out a pencil and a ruler, picked up Bowler's book, and started underlining passages that resonated with me.

Of all the paragraphs I underlined, this one stood out the most:

The terrible gift of a terrible illness is that it has, in fact, taught me to live in the moment. Nothing but this day matters.... And when I look closely at my life, I realize that I'm just learning to seize the day. In my finite life, the mundane has begun to sparkle. The things I love—the things I should love—become clearer, brighter.

I don't know whether I noticed the sparkle of the mundane as much before I had cancer as after, but I now readily make mental notes of sparkly moments in my day.

Today and Sunday, for instance, I marveled at fellow train passengers who willingly lifted my suitcase to place it on the overhead shelf on the train and took it down again when I had reached my destination. I would say, "I recently had surgery and this is just a bit too much for me," and they would cheerfully reply, "Of course, of course."

Today and yesterday, I was impressed by the servers at Cafe Landwer in Toronto. Just as they were when I visited Toronto in the spring, the restaurant's greeters and waiters were exceedingly welcoming, attentive and friendly.

Monday, I was grateful to the professionals at BioScript Pharmacy in Kingston, the dispensary that has been shipping olaparib to me every month for almost four years. Given that I will soon no longer be taking this maintenance drug, I realized that my relationship with the pharmacy was ending. So I took the opportunity to thank them for their support, saying: "To a person, you have been a professional, efficient, kind, positive and welcoming group of people." When they asked why I was discontinuing the drug and I shared my good news that my oncology team has concluded that the medication has done its job, they were genuinely happy for me.

Special moments like these have become clearer and brighter as I live each day, grateful that I am still here.