THIS IS THE LAST IN A SERIES OF THREE BLOGS.  TO READ THE OTHER TWO, START HERE:

I stood there, still unsure of what to say–but pretty clear now on what had happened, and pretty clear on what was about to happen.

Ray didn’t know who I was, and I had to tell him.

I felt bad–bad for Ray that he didn’t know who I was and that once I told him it might be embarrassing.  And fighting off a creeping sorry-for-myself feeling, too.  I mean, did I really look that bad?

“Ray,” I said, coming out of my growing pity party to focus on the tall, sweet gentleman who’d been so good and kind to me these last 5 weeks (this really was turning into the king of all awkward moments,)

“Ray, I AM Ann Murray.”

Dead silence.  Now it was his turn to be confused.

The entire moment–as well as the minutes afterward when I explained it all to Ray–were caught on film, and Linda and I have those tapes in a safety deposit box with the rest of the 100 min-DV films taped during the making of The Breast Cancer Diaries. Unfortunately, like the back story before it, it was impossible to weave the tale of Ann the Anchor and Radiation Ray into the film.  It was too far removed from the main story of Ann beating cancer’s butt and getting back on the horse of her life.

But the relationship that I have with Ray is now stronger than ever.  The stories we have together, begun in the radiation room and prequel-ed with the whole “I met Ann Murray once” flashback have made us lifelong friends.

In fact, on the day I finished my last radiation back in 2004, I went out to my car and found half a dozen whoopie pies nestled in a pink box on the hood of my car.  ”Not all at once, okay?” was the note from Ray and his wife–also my new friend–Nancy.  I burst into tears.  Just like I did this week, 7 years later, when the UPS man delivered a full dozen wicked whoopie pies to my door. “A little bit of home for you” was the note from Ray and Nancy.

Which is why the next time somebody in an audience asks me if there’s something that happened during the filming of The Breast Cancer Diaries movie that we had to cut that I wish we could have left in, along with my husband’s 7 seconds of skin, I’ll say,

“Yes. Radiation Ray.”

THIS IS PART TWO OF A THREE PART BLOG.  TO READ PART ONE, CLICK HERE.

And Ray went on:

“I met her once at Kristina’s Restaurant.  She was having lunch just before she had her baby and she hadn’t been on TV at Channel 6 forever.  And I stopped over and even though my wife didn’t want me to bother her, I had to tell her that she was my favorite news reporter and I couldn’t wait to have her come back after her maternity leave.”

I stood there, completely lost.  What was he talking about? And then it hit me like a key light falling from the rafters on a well-lit television set.  I remembered that guy.  I remember the fan who’d stopped by my table as I shoved a hefty caesar salad into my pregnant stomach and prayed that my water would break so I could have my body back.  I remember him saying how he loved to see me out on the sidewalks in a snowstorm with my big suede hat, telling people that it was, in fact, snowing. I looked at tall, affable Ray and realized–this is THAT guy!

And then–oh my word he has no idea who I am.

He has NO IDEA that Ann the savvy television anchor he adored and Ann the sick cancer patient he sees every week day of the week (and likely pities every night when he and Nancy go home after work) are ONE AND THE SAME person.

AND–he has no idea that that was me last night anchoring that live PBS show either.  He thinks I was working on the show– behind the scenes.

Linda had the camera rolling, picking up every sound–but the silence was deafening.  I still just stood there.  My mind was racing.

And then I knew why he didn’t know me.  I’d never talked about my former TV job while strapped to the radiation table.  It was too many worlds away from what I was in the middle of now with this beating-back-cancer diagnosis.  And being a tiny, gray-skinned, hairless and breastless cancer patient, I in no way resembled the bold tv reporter who’d used her bilingual skills to help blow the lid off the Decoster Egg Farm-migrant worker scandal in Turner a few years back, or celebrated the comeback of the Androscoggin River every spring.

And because I came into the office registered with my married name, Ann Paige, not Ann Murray, my television name, Ray would never have made the connection that I was actually Ann MURRAY Paige, former NBC StormCenter queen and Lewiston Bureau turned anchor reporter who left WCSH6 after she had her baby and turned up hosting civic affairs programs on Maine PBS for the last 6 years….including last night.

Oh my word.  How weird is THIS? And…. what do I do now?

PART THREE OF THIS BLOG WILL BE PUBLISHED TOMORROW.