A Weekend in Ann Arbor Amongst the Academics

And this is where it all happens . . . Sara's lab at the University of Michigan. Anybody see my beaker, anybody?

We arrived in Ann Arbor yesterday afternoon to spend time with my son Jim, Sara and their two kids. A is three and a half years and little O is four months old. A is spunky and hilarious and older than her years and she makes an amazing companion in any adventure. Now O is revealing her nature slowly but we have some indications of the woman she is to become. Her eyes are usually wide and incredulous with the joy she finds in her little life. She is ready to laugh and embrace whoever and whatever comes her way.

Sara presented her PhD defense on her thesis today. We walk down hallways with framed pictures of graduating classes from the 1800's and all the students are men. Now the halls are filled with women in lab coats and talking the academic talk and well, it's about time. Guess they should have let us out of the kitchen sooner . . .

And Jim has always told me that cancer will be cured on the molecular level. Now we cut out tumors and zap them with radiation and chemo but there is always that risk of a rogue cell escaping the process and traveling to another site to grow and destroy again. We must learn how to enter the cell and reprogram the mechanics to cause its self-destruction.

And so he gives me a lay person's synopsis in a nutshell of the work she has done. So bear with me and remember I am just a social worker.


The MLL gene is an important gene in our bodies that is needed for development and growing new blood cells. In order for cancer to happen a mutation must occur in a gene. In some cancers the MLL gene is broken and it attaches to a wrong gene. And this is how proteins are made and in these cases an abnormal protein is formed and this is what causes the cancer.

There are over 50 mutations associated with MLL fusion and all of them cause cancer.
So, it is recognized that some common mechanism is present in all MLL fusion proteins.

Sara found that these MLL fusion proteins recruit a complex of different proteins and this is not a normal process. The eventual conclusion here is that a drug will be developed that can target that complex and stop the cancer.


Still there? I needed to record this for my own benefit to read and remember at a later date. Dr. Hess, Sara's mentor and an MD/PhD himself says that she has made an important contribution to cancer research. He reminds me of the professor in Good Will Hunting - the hoitey-toitey guy with all the scarves who flirts with his young grad female students. Jay is probably nothing like this, my apologies, and we will see more of him at dinner tonight.

Sara comes to the end of her presentation to our group (she will then be grilled by four academics that have read her thesis and will be asking questions.) She thanks all the people responsible for her trip to the podium today, seven years of colleagues and friends, and then comes to my son, Jim. "Jim is my hero. He is the most amazing person . . ." and then she can go no further. The emotion overwhelms her and she cannot speak without tears. Oh, a mother lives for these moments. How can my heart be so full and not explode!

We visit Sara's lab and there is one thing I have always wondered about labs, not that I have been to that many labs. They're dirty, unorganized, boxes overflowing with supplies, things piled up and tumbling over. There is a continence pad used on hospital beds with some strange gook on it lying on the floor and everybody keeps walking around it. The floor is stained and dust is everywhere. Many computers, strange-looking microscopes and mechanisms, everything labeled with masking tape and felt tip pens. Refrigerators holding strange-looking specimens, boxes of plastic gloves and everything looking like it was pitched through the door way and left to land wherever. There is simply not enough room or counter top for everything that is needed in this room. How do they find anything? But there is an air of mystery and possibility here and all things are new and not definite. There are no rules and discovery is the magic that drives them. They could cure cancer here.

Sara does it. She finishes her defense and she has passed. She now has her PhD.

Road Trip

Leaving Dubuque tomorrow and traveling north to Ypsilanti, Michigan named after some Greek guy. We will be seeing my youngest son, Dr. Jim, his lovely lady Sara and their two children. Sara is giving her dissertation for her PhD in molecular biology at the University of Michigan and we are there to see it happen. Never attended this sort of thing and I am looking forward to learning something new. Her family whom I have not met will be there from Tallahassee, Florida where they had emigrated (immigrated? - what's the difference anyway?) from Persia many years ago and now, of course, the country is known as Iran. They foresaw the horrible impact of the impending Taliban and wanted to raise their children in the states. They chose an area with a climate similar to homeland and there they began their family. All ties to family and friends in the old country ceased with this move and no further contact was made. Sara is a lovely, gentle lady who cannot take her eyes from her children and my austere and always proper son is deeply in love with her.

We will be attending receptions and dinners and having chocolate fondue and wine and meeting with the head of the laboratory and basically it means three days in good clothes. I will need to make conversation with people I do not know but I will come away from this with a better knowledge of the young woman my son has chosen to grow old with. Cowboy Dave has promised me a hotel with pool and workout area.

The car ride is eight hours and I will fill it with books. I'm bringing George Sheehan's Running and Being - Davie Gie has inspired me to reread this sacred volume again. Also, Eat Pray Love - currently a movie starring Julia Child (ugh) but I heard the book was better than the flick so I'll avoid the theatre and stick with the book. And Mayflower by Nathan Philbrook - a volume recommended to my father by his boss, the head of the River Museum. I love long car rides and I can lazily do my reading and occasionally look up to see the bountiful cornfields and greenery at my leisure. Packed my booze, books, meds, toothpaste and a few clothes, too, and I am gone.

Disaster #37 in the Kitchen

Sometimes I feel like Lucy Ricardo when I cook - one catastrophe following another, a slapstick comedy unfolding in my little kitchen the size of a walk-in closet. Tuesday night and that means I cook for my father. My mother was a tough act to follow, and she truly shone in the kitchen. She had done more cooking and baking than her sisters back in the old farmhouse in Cascade, Iowa and not only did she have a flair for it, she brought love and passion to her craft. She enjoyed it.

Now my father is a challenge for even the best of chefs and I refused to cook for him when I was growing up. And my mother would not let me cook - I was delegated to the position of family baker and I won blue ribbons every summer for my sour cream chocolate cookies at the county fair. Only Mom was allowed to cook for the Master who could give out criticism with the best of them. One night I remember him taking a forkful of the casserole and commenting, "tastes like you scraped it off the basement floor." Not missing a beat my mother said, "as a matter of fact that's exactly what happened. I dropped the casserole when I took it out of the downstairs freezer." And it did not taste like that at all, but Dad was, well, Dad.

When I was 16 Mom had to be somewhere over the lunch hour and she asked me to prepare a BLT for my father returning from work. The bacon was not crisp enough, the tomatoes sliced too thickly, not enough lettuce and there was something wrong with the toast. I remember muttering something under my breath about, you know where McDonald's is, but I didn't, I was just eager to get out of the kitchen and be with my friends.

When I married the first time I called my mother from my home a hundred miles away and said, I don't know how to cook. She directed me to buy my first cook book, the Betty Crocker edition. And that's how I learned to boil an egg and make cherry sauce for ham slices.

At one time I had wished in my heart that Dad would go first. Mom and I would sell our townhouses and live in a one-floor condo. She would have her own bedroom and sitting room and would only need to be in the kitchen when she wanted to be, which would probably be a lot. I was worried about keeping Dad content tempered by almost sixty years of trying.

I have difficulty cooking since my mother died. It requires organization and consistency and these are qualities that seem impossible right now. I am good at simple, quick chores such as straightening up the books and magazines on my coffee table or ironing a shirt.

Dad likes chicken pot pie and I know there is a big container of chicken gravy dated 6-27 in my freezer. I made this for my parents on that date using homemade chicken stock, rotisserie chicken (such a great invention) and vegetables. Topped with Bisquick dumplings it is a tasty dish. Mom and Dad continue to love pot roast and casseroles and lasagna far into the summer when everybody is grilling. Anyway, I decide to cook this for my father. I thaw the gravy, buy and debone the chicken (I am too tired to recycle the containers and make new stock using the carcasses - I have many shortcuts since Mom has left) and cook the vegetables. The first indication of trouble came from the frozen bread dough.

I thaw the bread on a dish towel, all my loaf pans have mysteriously disappeared, and finally put the doughy lump in a casserole dish. I always forget when I put things in the oven and it's difficult to tell when the bread is done because it's whole wheat and already brown. When I slice it later the innards are soft and doughy and uncooked so I just slice off the edges all the way around and everybody gets the heel.

I come home late in the day and find the gravy separating as frozen products often will do. I throw the whole concoction: meat, gravy, onions, potatoes in a strainer and let all that icky water drain away. 45 minutes until Dad time. I take the gloppy mess and put it in a cake pan and into the oven. I can hear Mom saying, make sure it's hot enough before you put the Bisquick on or it will take forever for the biscuits to bake. Egads, it's not heating up fast enough! I scoop everything out of the pan, into a bowl, and into the microwave. I get out a new cake pan and throw it in the oven to preheat. After about 10 minutes it's boiling and so back in the pan in the stove. I realize I have let too much fluid drain away and the stuff is looking dry and lifeless. Alas, must make do. The final insult comes as I get out my 38-year-old coffee percolator given to me by my great-uncle at my first wedding (I do not drink coffee, thus, the absence of a more contemporary coffee maker. ) Dad MUST have coffee with dessert. I jerk it under the faucet and when I look inside I see its electrical cord curled on the bottom. Don't have time to dry the damn thing. I need to risk electrocution to make certain my father has his coffee with the carrot cake I have purchased from the local mart.

Thank God for Fincel's sweet corn. Something went right. And Dad, God love him, didn't say a word. Mom, are you laughing wherever you are?

I Wish It Were Sunday

Sparkling Mississippi, lovely lady in my life. Headed out on the flood wall for that early morning walk.


Practicing Jedi warriors at the marina. May the force keep you dry.




























A little touch of Greece on University avenue: chicken dill lemon soup, the naked gyro, and paprika in the salad that tickles the back of my throat.
























Bikers are everywhere and not the Davie Gie kind. Keep a low profile and don't attract attention.

Rock on , funky guys.

This guy offered me a ride on his Harley. Again, why do I always attract the dregs of society? And then he stalked me for about half an hour . . .







Okay, here's how we do things on the weekend in this household. First, plan when and how to exercise. Second, where and what to eat. And lastly, whatever the community calender has to offer.

Just finished an hour walking on the flood wall. Our first cool morning in a long span of monotonous hot, hot days and the city is out celebrating. Runners, cyclists, babies in biker baskets, an occasional wheelchair and one lone Harley rider. Potato-potato-potato . . . did you know the Harley engine idle sound has a patent? Only in America can these things happen. There are children with numbers on their chests racing cheered on by smiling parents. The children are sweating and do not look happy about their predicament. An enthusiastic red-headed woman whom I have encountered many times on my walk sings out to me "Good Morning!" like the first line of the Hallelujah Chorus. She is sitting on a bench and she says, "It is so beautiful I just had to sit here and LOOK!" Yes, I agree, we must remember this, thinking of the cold grey months ahead of us.

Cowboy Dave is doing his stint at his fitness club. Dave is a joiner, I am not. He likes the social circle, the human contact when he exercises and the club provides this. It also includes a sauna and shower facilities and several TVs so the man will not miss any televised sports events.

I am first in the pool on Sutton's last day. I swim my laps and leave without lingering. Don't want to stir up any sentimental thoughts here. Have a peaceful sleep under the snows, lovely pool, you will be in my winter dreams.

And I dream of my little mother last night, the first time. I was getting into the back seat of a car with my brother Mark. My father was driving and my mother was sitting in the passenger seat next to him. I cannot see her face as she is wearing a hooded sweatshirt. We were going to a restaurant and I thought, how can this be that Mom is here and . . . eating. I want to ask her, how is it where you are, what is it like. But something causes me to pull back and the thought says, don't ask her that, it may frighten her, she is not completely aware of what has happened. Instead, I say, how are you, Mom, but I waken before she can answer . . .

And then we eat. The Athenian Grill and I have my usual: delectable chicken lemon dill soup - and a bowl, not a cup, never a cup! And a naked gyro - just spiced meat and warm pita bread. Leave off the tomato, the lettuce and especially that tzatziki sauce. If I want a salad I'll order one - and I did - a lovely Greek concoction with feta cheese and paprika. The olive needs to go. I have been referred to as the "soup lady" in this little cafe and I take frozen chicken soup home to maintain my reputation.

And we're off and across the river to the state of cheese and a biker party in New Diggings, Wisconsin. For some reason many years ago this little village was designated as official Harley Davidson country and the two small saloons are filled with black- leathered folk and their old ladies. Only beer served here and the customers are as interesting as the music, a rocking blues band from North Carolina. These youngsters can blast out Johnny Cash, Jim Morrison and Stevie Ray like firecrackers. Those boys have old souls. We have roasted corn on the cob on the grill and sit with Crazy Tom and his new woman, Beverly, a Florida transplant who says she will stay the winter . . .

And in a few days I will be eating sushi in Michigan with a pack of transplanted Iranians . . .

A Love Affair with George Sheehan

My cyclist bro Davie Gie and I share a fondness for George Sheehan's book Running and Being. In fact I stole your copy, Dave, and that is why you cannot find yours. An intriguing fellow he exercised first and then lived the rest of his life which included a busy medical practice and a large family. The interesting thing about the man is that he was a dyed-in-the-wool introvert despite having the prestigious career thing going for him. And I quote, "I am a nervous, shy noncombatant who has no feeling for people. I find no happiness in carnival, no joy in community. I am one with the writers on The New Yorker whom Brendan Gill described. They touched each other only by accident, were secretive about everything, and never introduced anyone properly."

I walk into the house dripping from my hour at the pool and the rain begins to pour from the leaden skies. I have been lucky with weather and schedules this summer and have been able to maintain a daily swim. I was loathe to leave today and continued to stay in those cool waters and watch the sky turn colors. Due to the great amount of time I spend outdoors I am fairly talented at reading the sky just like any mailman (mailperson) would be. I knew the creases of light behind the darknesses was not a rain sky.

It is difficult for me to be indoors and I wonder if my current job choice was influenced by the fact that I work on the third floor and there are large windows looking down on trees and gardens. After years of working in cubicles and dealing with the craziness of social work I now plan piano recitals and crafts sessions with my Alzheimer's patients. They are like old children and live long lives because - well, they don't realize they are old. They will pass a mirror and wonder who is that old person looking out. Show them a picture of themselves and their spouses and they will possibly know the "old man," but who is that old lady he is with? They do not know my name and they probably can't acknowledge my existence if I am not in their line of vision, but they smile when they see me and look relieved because I represent sameness and security in their abbreviated lives. They know I belong with them.

Oh, I look out those windows a lot and wait for the bell to ring and I am free again.

I will miss my summer swimming and I will check with the YM/YWCA but their fees are probably astronomical and I heard the "Y" stands for "yuppie" - a horrid group of wannabe LA- ers of whom I could never associate. My mountain-climbing, vegan, world-traveling son abhors tourists from LA in the mountains. "They wear loud, inappropriate colors, they are afraid of big dogs (all dogs are big in Colorado) and they talk and laugh too loudly. They have no mountain etiquette." A term I had never heard until I accidentally walked off a mountain trail and was given a heated lecture on protecting the ecosystems and this means stay on the path.

Sheehan's book is a journal of conflicts as he is a man of talent and knowledge and should be the proverbial pillar of the community - member of clubs and organizations, a man mindful of community progress, encouraging the growth of the intellectual world around him by being a part of that world. But he is none of that. He does his job quietly waiting for the open road ahead for him, choosing not to spend time with his family. He is aware this is not how things are done, but it causes him no pain or conflict. Davie and I kinda like that. ( Well, he should spend time with the family . . .)

But mainly I read the book because it describes exercise as the highest form of meditation a human can do. Fitness leaves the physical world and joins with the mystic spirituality of a higher consciousness.

And I have this copied and laminated and sticking on my refrigerator. George says, "First I ran from instinct. Later I was forced to exercise in phys ed. Even later I came to run and exercise because it was prescribed by authorities. But finally I have come to run because it is the right and true and just thing for me to do. In the process I may be helping my arteries and heart and circulation as well, but that is not my concern.

"My true aim now is a state of fitness prior to and unrelated to sickness or disease. My true task, to live at my authentic level. My true goal to reach my original splendor."

Death of a Pancake

Did I mention that I am a full-time babysitter during the summer months? It is unpaid work as I want to help my daughter save expenses and I am in a fortunate position that my husband's salary is adequate and he doesn't squawk too much about my not bringing in a larger paycheck. I also work hours at a nursing home in the Alzheimer's unit and my time there will increase when school resumes. I continue to sit two-and-a-half year old Cameron three days weekly throughout the school calendar. Did I mention that it is unpaid work? Oh no, no, no. The hours are filled with the ringing laughter and the innocent hi jinks of my adorable charges and I am infinitely blessed with their precious companionship and beguiling stories .

And that would be a load of fossilized excrement and then some. This is work. Mother may be the name of God on the lips of children, but what about grandmother? Well, I'm not sure but maybe it will come to me at a later date. The roles sometimes blur.

Adam and I had breakfast at the IHOP this morning. He ordered a Funny Face pancake and it was chocolate and the size of a dinner plate with maraschino cherries for eyes, whipping cream facial features and chocolate chips sprinkled all over. And then he proceeded to put syrup on it pretending he was pouring hot coffee on some poor schmuck's face. He made growling and moaning sounds as the pancake came to life in his own mind and he snarled, "your blood is the same color as your eyes (yes, the cherries.)"

He took a picture of his half- eaten breakfast when he went to take a "water whiz" as he wanted to make sure I would not nibble on any of it. Fat chance on that one. He also had me take a picture when he first got the thing and then when the plate was empty. His brother had done the same thing with a trout he had caught and the second shot showed just a skeleton of fish bones. He then proceeded to describe how the fish lungs and heart were still present when Ethan ate the fish and then the yolk of my eggs just wasn't appetizing at that point.

On the way home his water bottle became a ray gun, machine gun and lastly, a gun that sprayed gasoline and then set its victim on fire. There were no pedestrians standing or riding at the end of our trip.

Here is a scenario. Two young boys and two young girls are playing with blocks. The girls are building a house and the boys are doing the same thing. Once the structures are complete the girls begin to decorate and inhabit the place with people, imaginary or not. The boys? That house of blocks is history. It is blown up, pelted with giant hailstones, zapped by an alien ship or stomped flat by a giant tyrannosaurus rex. Testosterone is a fearsome thing.

So what is the name of grandmother on the lips of children? I'm open to suggestions on that one.

The First Death

"With my mother's death all settled happiness, all that was tranquil and reliable, disappeared from my life. There was to be much fun, many pleasures, many stabs of joy; but no more of the old security. It was sea and islands now, the great continent had sunk like Atlantis." C.S. Lewis

I awaken too early once again and feel the emptiness of a world without my mother. These are the difficult hours. I can fill my day with noisey children and strenuous exercise and I can overload my senses with the beauty of this blue/green planet. I push and shove all kinds of diversions into my daylight hours and I can fall asleep exhausted by the overload with muscles still aching from the swim and the tumble of grandchildren. But I cannot escape the early dawn solitude.

Up until now this had been one of my favorite times. I awaken to the sounds of birds and crickets. We live at the end of a road surrounded by property owned by the Franciscan Sisters. There are farmlands to the north of us and the motherhouse and its extensive prairie fields to the east. Here we have quiet and natural sounds and no traffic rumble interrupting our thoughts.

It has always been a sweet and gentle way to enter my conscious world again. I can contemplate the day ahead of me. What chores await me, will there be free time and how should I fill that precious time slot - a walk by the river, a new book to begin, perhaps a pie to be baked.

But now when my eyes open I feel a heaviness settling around me, a buzz in my head that threatens to get louder, a constriction in my chest as if I never will take a full breath again.

"After the first death, there is no other," wrote Dylan Thomas. I am not quite sure what this means, but I think my mother's passing is that first death for me. I am blessed to have had my parents alive and close to me all these years. All my friends lost their parents decades ago and I have always recognized my great fortune in this area of my life. I have had few significant deaths considering I am nearing the 60 year marker and those deaths were long ago. I think Thomas is saying when that first important loss occurs it alters us and marks us. It scoops us up and lays us on the wayside on the journey of life. I feel I have been halted for an undetermined amount of time. I am not growing and learning at this junction of my existence. I am alone and cold sitting outside the window looking in at the fireside.

Larkin Warren writes on grief, "Welcome, fellow human, to a different country than the one you woke up to this morning." And he is right. The air feels different, I am hearing and seeing with muted senses, I place food in my mouth and tell myself to chew.
I know I am going to be all right. I know the waves won't rush over me and pull me under. I know all that. I just don't know the logistics and framework of how this process will happen for me.

Okay, so a couple of hours later while waiting for my charges to show I decide to play some music and I blindly push the button on my Sony machine and what comes to my ears is the beautiful strains of Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child. Hee hee hoo hoo, some cosmic presence is playing my strings today and I laugh. It can be good.