The first time I considered going to see Noah Kahan at Fenway, most of the tickets were already gone. The idea came up in a conversation with a psychic, who told me I would definitely be there this summer.
When I mentioned that to my ex-husband, he said the psychic was probably right and told me to reach out to his friend, a longtime Fenway vendor.
They were both right.
Through that connection, I got tickets for night three of four. Todd agreed to come because he loves me, not because he knows every Noah Kahan song the way I do, and the way so many other people in the park clearly did too.
I knew there would be a crowd. I knew Fenway would feel magical, the way it always does to New England kids raised on the hometown team. I knew I would sing, dance, and probably cry.
What I did not know was that I would end up sitting next to a woman whose father had been in the first clinical trial for the immunotherapy that saved both his life and mine.
Once I understood that, before the sun had even gone down on a 33,000-person singalong, I dug through the bottom of my purse and found a rolled-up Melanoma Cancer Sharks sticker from the very first batch I ever made.
I did not know it was still in there. The second I found it, I knew exactly what to do.
When the applause died down, I handed it to her.
“Please give this to your dad,” I said. “With my eternal thanks. He saved my life.”
She smiled, teared up, took the sticker, and said she would.
That was all.
A small exchange in a loud stadium.
But some moments arrive already glowing.
And all night, I kept thinking about how survival moves. From trial to treatment. From stranger to stranger. From one family to another.
All my love.
And I loved it….