Last Days

We nearly make it to the cash register when Mom realizes she's forgotten the coupon for a Christmas turkey.

"Oh, nuts," she groans. The two of us have been standing in line forever. Skagway is packed to the gills with holiday shoppers. We're tired and cranky. Then Mom spies a frail, elderly gentleman two aisles away clutching a precious turkey coupon in one hand and wielding a cannister of oxygen in the other.

She whispers to me. "If you're very, very nice to that old man, I bet he'd give you his coupon." 

Preparing the Christmas turkey - Mom's last Christmas.

I stare at her. "You've got to be kidding."

She cocks an eyebrow. "Oh c'mon. How do you think I met my husband?"

We laugh so hard we cry. Mom leans on me, and I lean on the grocery cart, our knees weak with laughter. Nearby shoppers smile in sympathy. 

It feels good to laugh. 

Almost two years after her diagnosis, Mom's cancer spreads to her spine. It's a devastating blow. And the timing couldn't be worse. Dad's business has transferred him to Omaha to save the sinking Robert's Dairy. Because of Mom's illness, there's no question of moving Mom and my little brothers and sisters. Dad commutes back and forth from Omaha to Grand Island. He leaves at 4 a.m. Monday morning for Omaha, lives in a motel all week, then drives back to Grand Island Friday evening. 

Just graduated from college and employed by my old high school, Central Catholic, I am grateful to be home and near Mom and my siblings. 

This Christmas, we are a family in denial. None of us, not even Dad, will speak aloud of our fear that Mom may leave us soon. Instead, we joyfully decorate the tree and observe every tradition just as if this Christmas is like any other. After Mass, we tumble into the living room around the tree. Since I'm the oldest, I read aloud the wondrous story of the Nativity from the Bible, and we sing "Silent Night" then "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer" because it's Terri, Carry, Tommy and Jeff's favorite. The eyes of the little kids shine with excitement. Mom is determined that this should be a happy Christmas.

Nevertheless, reality hits with a bleak thud right after the New Year. Mom's cancer grows with a vengeance. She's hospitalized twice and returns home weakened and pale. Getting out of her recliner or bed is such an ordeal that my brothers and sisters each take turns staying home from school to care for her.

Terri, Tommy and Carry

One day in fifth grade, Carry, who is 11, suddenly lowers her head onto her desk and begins to sob. Her kind teacher at Engleman Elementary gathers my little sister into her arms and ushers her out to the hallway.

During one of Mom's hospitalizations, I find seven-year-old Jeff in Mom and Dad's bed hugging Mom's pillow and weeping.

Deb and Mary, only teenagers, take over the cooking and the laundry. Terri and Tommy rub Mom's sore back, and Joe, Mick and Rick - my tall, handsome brothers - sit close to Mom talking softly and sometimes teasing her to make her laugh.

One night when Mom is struggling terribly, I crawl into bed with her to administer her medicine and massage her sore back. When at last she dozes fitfully, I wrap my arms around her. Maybe, I think, if I hold her tightly, I can keep her with us forever.

Pain jolts her awake, and she moans and sobs in agony. The pills don't work any more. Desperate, I half carry her to my little car and drive her to the hospital.

"Dad?" I call my father as soon as the nurses wheel Mom off. "I think you need to come home."

He walks through our door that very night. My brothers and sisters and I are weak with relief to see him. For the first time in his life, he doesn't worry about the dairy or what will happen if he's not behind his desk. Day in and day out, he sits with Mom, and we all take comfort in his bigger-than-life presence. Dad can fix anything, we tell ourselves. But he can't fix this.

Time stops still at our house. Mom fails noticeably every day. Easter Sunday arrives, and we barely remember to arrange baskets for the little kids.  Early Monday morning, Dad calls the doctor himself and after a long time comes to us with red rimmed eyes. "It's time to tell Mom goodbye," he chokes.

It's the day after Easter, a beautiful afternoon in April. Birds sing gloriously outside the open windows. But we are mutely staring at the floor. My four little brothers and sisters crawl into Dad's lap clutching him and sobbing. My own hot tears drip onto the carpet, and I want to throw a brick at those freaking birds.

Aunt Patty and MaryLee, Dad's sister and cousin, both arrive from Colorado - two wonderful women who have loved us all our lives. At the hospital, we all file quietly into my mother's room. Father Harold Kurtenbach, our parish pastor, arrives at the same time we do and quietly consoles us.

"Patti?" Dad whispers to Mom who has been semi-conscious for the last several hours. "Look who's here!"

She opens her eyes in confusion to see Father Kurtenbach's kind face leaning above her.

"Do you know who I am, Patti?" he asks softly.

She blinks. "The Easter Bunny?"

Father Kurtenbach laughs and warmly clasps her hand. Struggling, she gazes up foggily until she recognizes him.

"Am I going to die?" she whispers.

She asks it like a little child. Dad and all of us are caught off guard. Not one time have we ever talked to Mom or each other about her impending death. It hurts me now to think how much Mom needed to talk about the end of her life.

"Are you afraid to die, Patti?" Father Kurtenbach says gently.

Almost imperceptibly, she shakes her head. "No," she says. Her gaze fades, and she falls asleep.

It's the last time Mom ever speaks. After that, she lapses into an enduring unconsciousness. All around her bed are cards and flowers from neighbors and close friends. A magnificent Easter lily fills the room with one stubborn blossom that refuses to open. I stare dully at it. The Easter message of resurrection fails to rouse my hope while Mom lies pale and silent.

It grows late, and Dad orders the little kids home. Mom's good friend, Sue Wisnieski, assures us she will go with them and get them to bed. The rest of us stay. Wonderful Father Kurtenbach refuses to leave us. He chats softly with Dad and Aunt Patty and MaryLee.

My brothers and sisters and I sit quietly. Once in a while, when Mom grows agitated, I brush her hair. It always quiets her. But now, she becomes unusually restless, and the adults in the room are instantly attentive. Mom shudders with a deep breath, and suddenly we are all on our feet surrounding her bed. I have never watched anybody die. That the first person I will watch leave this world is my sweet mother takes my breath away.

A nurse slips into the room and makes a quick assessment. "There's nothing else we can do," she tells Dad.

Mom's breathing grows shallow. Suddenly, she releases a tremendous gasp and seems to stop breathing. We think she is gone until her eyes fly open and she looks for Dad. He reaches over to close her eyes, but she instantly opens them again and stares intently at him. Dad takes Mom's hand, and the two of them gaze at each other for a long, long time until Mom gasps again. Finally she closes her eyes for the last time and is gone.

"Goodbye, Patti," Dad sighs raggedly. "I love you."

Last photo of Mom.

My brothers and sisters and I reach for each other and hold on for dear life, hardly able to absorb the events of these past hours. We cry and cry around my mother's bed.

Father Kurtenbach gently makes the Sign of the Cross on Mom's head then quietly comforts Dad who still holds her hand. At last, he and Aunt Patty and MaryLee gather us together towards the door of the hospital room.

"Go," Father instructs us. "I'll stay with her."

With great effort, we pull ourselves together, and as Dad leads, we file out of the room one at a time. But before I step into the hall, I look back at the still form of my mother. Father Kurtenbach prays softly over her body.

And on the table beside her bed, the last Easter lily has finally bloomed.

Girl on the Wall

My little brothers and sisters are busily collecting Bicentennial quarters.

"These are gonna be worth a lot someday," my 7-year-old brother Tommy proudly displays a fistful of quarters. "Maybe a million dollars."

Everybody's excited about the Bicentennial. Our neighbor Ted George presides over the dedication of our brand new Capital Heights Park and announces the very first fireworks' display. "Wasn't THAT a good one!" he oohs and aahs into a tinny sounding microphone as explosions of color light up the Nebraska night sky.

This summer of 1976, I'm finishing my junior year at Kearney State. Joe completes his freshman year there, and Mick's just graduated from Central Catholic High School. We're all home and together for the 4th, but even as Dad grills burgers and we troop over at dusk for Ted George's fireworks' show, a cloud hovers over our own Bicentennial celebration.

Mom's discovered a lump in her breast. One afternoon she's reading an article in Reader's Digest about Happy Rockefeller's diagnosis of breast cancer and is compelled to examine her own breasts when she discovers the marble sized hard lump.

Mom

I am 21 and old enough to recognize fear. Her beautiful brown eyes are wide and strained, and she's unusually distracted and irritable.

"Stop sighing, Patti!" Dad snaps with impatience ."Everything's fine!"  I'm old enough to know he's scared, too.

Delving into medical books from the city library, I memorize the encouraging words of cancer experts. "The vast majority of breast lumps, more than 80%," I read in volume after volume, "are benign,"

I hold up the words in small black print for Mom.  "See?" I am trying to reassure her as much as myself.

Nobody can believe Mom is the mother of ten. Elegant and beautiful, she walks into church, the grocery store or a basketball game, and all heads turn. Seemingly oblivious to the admiring glances all around, she disarms her friends and us with her quick humor and loving laughter. I am always proud of my lovely mother. Right now, though, I am frightened for her, too.

A biopsy is scheduled for the middle of July. Mom and I are carrying laundry in baskets to the little boys' room when, for some reason, the portrait of the old-fashioned young woman that has hung on our living room wall as long as I can remember catches my eye. Her dress is ruffled and scooped at the neckline, and there is an air of familiarity about her. I don't remember a time that she hasn't gazed soulfully out of her frame at whatever it is in the distance that fascinates her. From time to time I wonder about her.

"Who is that girl, Mom?" I finally remember to ask.

"My grandmother," Mom says. "My dad's mom."

Mom opens her Christmas present, 1972

I'm shocked. So the young woman on the wall is not, after all, some nameless stranger.

"I've never heard you talk about her," I say.

"I never knew her," Mom says. "She died when my dad was only ten."

I study my great-grandmother's face. She has Mom's high cheekbones, and I experience a sudden kinship. "How did she die?"

Mom's eyes fill. "Breast cancer," she says.

My heart lurches. Wordless, Mom and I stare at the picture. Finally, I drop the basket of laundry to hug my mother. "It won't happen to you, Mom."

She clings to me gratefully, then we pull ourselves together and lug the laundry away. We don't say anything more about it. In 1976, nobody says much about breast cancer. Mom is stoic, and Dad is nervous. We wait for the biopsy, and I wonder about my great-grandmother. She would have been in her 30's when she died, I calculate. Why does nobody speak of her? Mom will not talk about her now, and I don't ask. But I wonder if my great-grandmother has gifted my mother with a terrible legacy, a small black box that nobody wants to open.

In 1976, a breast biopsy means two things: either Mom will wake up to a relieved surgeon who will assure her that everything's fine, or she will wake up without a breast.

The second she opens her eyes to see Dad's devastated face, she knows.

The worst part is that I'm not there. Dad has persuaded me to return to Kearney for summer school and my job.

"It won't be anything at all. I'll call you," he says.

When he doesn't call, I call him. My fingers shake. I know the surgery is scheduled for early morning, and it's past noon now.

"It's cancer," Dad says shortly over the phone. He does not cry, but I do. Right on the phone. I cry like I am ten-years-old until Dad finally calms me. "Come home tonight," he instructs me. "I'll take you to see your mother."

And I do. But before I hop the Greyhound bus, I walk downtown to purchase a robe for Mom. When it is wrapped by a sales clerk in a huge box, I take it with me on the bus and clutch it all the way home. Dad meets me at the station, and we drive to the hospital.

Mom and Dad "oohing" over Deb's birthday gift, 1977.

"Time to be strong, Babe," he instructs me gently. "You can't go into your mom's room and break down."

Deeply ashamed, I promise him I will not cry. But the truth is, I'm scared to see Mom. I'm scared to see her without a breast. For the first time in my life, I don't know what to say to my own mother or how to comfort her.

When I stride nervously through the door of her hospital room clutching the big box, it crashes against the sides of the door jamb and flings me backwards into the hall. Mom laughs - her glorious, warm laugh. And then I know it will be all right.

Even after her operation, she is still beautiful and funny. It's only after a few weeks that I note a subtle change. Outwardly, Mom heals and begins radiation treatments. She helps Terri with her times tables and races Tommy to the front door every day after school. She cuddles and tickles our baby brother Jeff until they are both laughing and gasping for breath. But her gaze lingers on all of us, especially on my younger siblings. I am very afraid she is saying her goodbyes.

Sometimes I study the picture of my great grandmother and try to unlock the secrets of her wistful young face. I think about her terrible anguish at leaving a ten-year-old son and a baby boy and beg her to help her granddaughter. "Don't let Mom have to leave us," I plead silently.

Exactly 40 years after Mom discovers she has cancer, I am sitting in a hospital room in Omaha watching my youngest sister Carry sleep. My good brothers Joe and Rick, my sister Terri and my sister-in-law Jan have just departed. We have waited all morning together as Carry undergoes a grueling operation to remove both her breasts due to a particularly virulent form of breast cancer.

Six years ago, when my darling little sister Terri is diagnosed with breast cancer and courageously endures a double mastectomy, my sisters and I band together to face our worst fear. Soon Deb is diagnosed with a pre-breast cancer, and because we all know the jig is up, Deb and Mary and I elect to have preventive double mastectomies.  Within six months, the four of us will lose our breasts. But Carry is the last hold-out.

Big brother Rick comforts Carry.

"I'm not getting a mastectomy because I'm not getting breast cancer," my baby sister flashes stubbornly.

Our great-grandmother's legacy, however, will not be deterred. Like a locomotive, it roars through the generations of women in our family. Carry, however, like Terri, will discover her cancer in its very earliest stages. Because it is an aggressive cancer, she endures several months of chemotherapy before her surgery. But the enemy will not take her from us. She will be the last of the five of us to lose her breasts.

Cancer tests our faith to its very limits. It's a little like the old Biblical story of Jacob wrestling the angel. "I will not let thee go until thee bless me!" Jacob shouts at the angel.

My family knows all about wrestling angels. Our hard fought blessings have come at a great cost, though. Mom, like her grandmother before her, will not live to see my little brothers and sisters grow up. She leaves behind a terrible hole that, no matter how hard we try, cannot be filled by anybody but her.

Ever vigilant and aware of the enemy, however, my sisters and I will live to see our own children grow up and even our grandchildren. We have our much loved mother to thank for that - funny, quirky, lovely Mom.

And the beautiful girl on the wall.

Jeff

Mom worries about our baby brother.

Jeffrey Joseph is a year old and still makes no attempt to walk or even to pull himself up in his crib. Mom takes him back again and again to our gruff old pediatrician who finally throws up his hands.

"You worry about this baby too much," he growls irritably. "His only trouble is that he's got nine brothers and sisters who do everything for him!"

Mom and Jeffrey Joseph, 1971

Mom wants desperately to believe him. In a few months, however, when Jeff is still not walking, Mom takes him to another doctor who recommends a visit to Omaha for tests with specialists. Dad takes the day off, and he and Mom bundle our baby brother up to make the all important trip for the results of the tests. They don't return until after 8 that night, and by then we're all anxious to hear only that our sweet, yellow-haired brother is fine and healthy. When we crowd around them at the door, though, we know immediately Mom has been crying.

"Kids," Dad ushers us into the living room, "everybody sit down," he says gently. He and Mom don't even bother to remove their heavy coats. We are silent and fearful for what he will tell us. Mom, who holds Jeff close, eases herself onto the big couch next to Dad, and the rest of us assemble on the floor to face them. Dad's eyes are piercingly blue and bore into us as they do when he is about to tell us something earth shaking, like "Somebody took the money off my dresser" or "We're moving to Grand Island, Nebaska." Mom says nothing but avoids our eyes as she removes Jeff's jacket and mittens. We wish Dad would say something.

"What's wrong with Jeff?" Joe finally breaks the silence.

Dad sighs deeply. "Your little brother has Cerebral Palsy."

We stare back. None of us has ever heard of Cerebral Palsy, but it sounds frightening and final, as if Jeff might die.

Dad rubs his hand over his face. "It's something that affects Jeff's muscles. He may have trouble walking and talking."

Our baby brother, the subject of this dire discussion, sits on Mom's lap free of the heavy jacket and mittens and grins.

"Will he get over it?" I ask. My voice shakes.

Mom looks up to smile tremulously. "No, but he'll be all right," she tries to sound confident. "We'll all help him to be all right."

We don't believe her. Our baby brother will struggle the rest of his life to walk and talk. How can anything ever be all right?

Jeffrey dresses himself up as Santa Claus, 1975

Instinctively, our little brother Tommy, who is not quite four-years-old but who regards himself as Jeff's personal caretaker, goes to Jeff and gently pats his back. "It's okay, Jeffy," he sings softly. "Everything's okay."

Mom loses her composure and weeps softly. Dad moves closer to put his arm around her. His blue eyes are very bright when he looks at us. "We're a big family, and we've been very lucky," he says. "Things like this happen. But we'll get through it."

Dad's always talking about getting through things as a family. "Family is everything!" he reminds us when we bicker and argue with each other. Most of the time I roll my eyes and long for the time I can depart for college to enjoy space and privacy without a million kids around.

But tonight I am grateful for my brothers and sisters. Life all at once seems perilous and uncertain, and each of us feels a great surge of protectiveness for our baby brother who sits innocently on my mother's lap. We want to shield him from the frightening future ahead. We want him to enjoy a healthy, happy life. We want him to be normal.

But we will not be able to protect him from everything. Most importantly, we learn that "normal" is a detestable word. Jeff is neither normal nor abnormal. He is our baby brother who must face a world outside our front door that is not always kind to him.

In kindergarten, he will enter special ed classes with braces on his legs. For the first time in his life, he will discover he's different - that other kids will leave him to himself on the playground. Teachers are kind, but he will want only to run and play with his classmates.

"I can't run good," he cries at home as my mother pulls him close.

"You know what your big brother Mick calls me when I run?" Mom comforts him. "Turtle! Can you believe that?"

Jeff, in spite of himself, giggles. Mom can always make him laugh. My sister Mary, only 13, constantly carts him around on her hip. "Little Mother", Mom calls her. At home, Jeff is safe. But even at home, we must remind him to swallow. His disability causes him to drool incessantly. When he walks on his toes, Dad will remind him to plant his heels on the floor.  "Heel, toe, Jeff!"

Tom and Jeff, 1985

In middle school, an unforgiving teacher will refuse to adapt her social studies class to Jeff's needs. I tutor him for hours drilling him over Machu Piccu, the Incas and the Andes Mountains. Tired and frustrated, I snap at him when he can't keep it all straight. "Concentrate, Jeff!" After a moment, I hear his soft sob. He cries next to me on the tv room couch. We've studied for more than two hours straight, and he's exhausted. I cannot forgive myself in that moment.

"You know what I think about your social studies teacher?" I burn with rage. "She's a mean old cow, and I hate her."

Jeff is so surprised, he forgets to cry. We make a peanut butter sandwich and forget about Machu Piccu.

But there are kind teachers, too - teachers like my beautiful friend Ellen May, Jeff's special ed teacher at Northwest High School, who will love him and encourage him. Jeff gravitates to her kindness and feels confident in her classroom.

More than anybody, Jeff will depend on our brother Tom. Tom reassures him, teases him, includes him, and is best friend to him. For all their lives, Tom will watch out for his little brother.

Jeff will never drive a car, never attend college, never own his own home. In fact, the difficulties and loneliness of his disability will drive him to despair and alcohol and substance abuse. For a long time, we fear that we will lose Jeff forever - that he is destined for an early death.

Jeff today.

But we underestimate our youngest brother. With a supreme faith in God, he will fight to overcome his addictions. When we give him up for dead, he astounds us with his will to live. Sometimes, I think with awe, my baby brother is the strongest and bravest of us all. Jeff enriches our lives and helps us to be bigger and better people. He shows us how to be more tolerant, more perceptive, more understanding. Just more.

But tonight, when Jeff is 17 months old, and we are huddled together in the living room, none of us knows how strong Jeff must become - how strong we all must become. Tonight he is only my sweet, yellow haired baby brother.

One day, though, he will be my hero.

The Old Brown Station Wagon

More than anything else, the Old Brown Station Wagon forces us to cooperate.

In the closest of proximity, you can only argue, elbow and punch each other for so long. Pretty soon you figure it's less exhausting to simply sit, mope, and see the ride through. Occasionally, though, on long trips back to Denver to see our cousins, we learn to become inventive to help pass the time. We sing the Micky Mouse song in four part harmony or belt out "Jeremiah was a Bullfrog" like Three Dog Night.

Especially on the interstate, we notice a disturbing tendency by people who pass around our vehicle. With a kind of wonder, they stare through the window and attempt to quickly count our heads.  At first we're insulted. Then we decide to give them their money's worth. We contort our bodies and flail our arms and heads to the beat of non-existent heavy metal music.  Other times we pretend to be sound asleep - all ten of us - with our heads thrown back and drool dribbling down our chins. One time our brothers coax us into acting as if we're deranged juvenile delinquents being transferred to another facility, and we growl and sneer at passersby and sometimes claw at the windows. The startled reactions keep us entertained for hours. But Mom puts a stop to that.

When Joe, Mick and Rick all become of driving age, Dad shocks us by buying a brand new station wagon. Never in our lives have we been a two-car family. Dad parks his new baby in the garage and tosses us the keys to the Old Brown Station Wagon.

"It's all yours, Kids," he beams. "Be careful, and remember," he says, suddenly sober, "take care of this old car, and it'll take care of you."

We can hardly believe the enormous rush of independence. Having a second car means we can drive ourselves to school, and Dad can take himself to work. If we're delighted, however, Mom is ecstatic. She spends the better part of her day taking us to and from our various destinations and gladly surrenders her chauffeur duties.

The Old Brown Station Wagon has survived ten kids, two dogs and nearly two hundred thousand miles. Dad always takes loving care of it. It's never missed an oil change, a bath, or even a wax, and it's never so much as suffered a scratch.

All that changes when my brothers take the wheel. If a car has feelings, the Old Brown Station Wagon must think it's died and gone to Hell.

Within a month, Mick manages to drive it into a light pole in the Skagway parking lot. Dad is furious. Even though he hands the car over to us, he's still paying for auto insurance. Suddenly his premiums, always low because of Dad's flawless driving record, skyrocket into oblivion.

"How do you drive into a pole?" he yells at Mick.

But you never get the whole story with Mick. He vaguely suggests the possibility of black ice but is deliberately sketchy on details.

"Brick by brick," Dad shakes his head.

Dad repairs the car, and in a week, Joe rounds a corner by Blessed Sacrament school and rams it into another light pole. This time it's St. Patty's Day, the Old Brown Station Wagon is towed home, and Joe smells suspiciously of alcohol.

"Have you been drinking?" Dad glares at Joe.

Mom refuses to believe it. "It must be my perfume you smell," she convinces Dad. The details of Joe's accident are even sketchier than Mick's, and Dad shakes his head and walks away from Joe without another word. But he washes his hands of any more repair bills.

Thanksgiving Day, 1976

Unfortunately, the Old Brown Station Wagon is permanently disabled after its last scrape. The worst part is that it no longer shifts into reverse. My brothers work part time at Skagway to pay for their Central Catholic High School tuition. They have no spare money for repair bills. Driving a car without a reverse gear, therefore, poses a new wrinkle. You don't hop into a car that doesn't shift into reverse to go joy riding. Every trip to school, work, or even to the gas station for a fill up requires strategic planning.

There's no getting around our driveway, however. With no curbside parking on busy Capital Avenue, Joe masters an ingenious method of backing the car into the driveway. With the driver side door wide open, Joe stretches out his leg and pushes the car back with his left foot at the same time he steers it into position. Only one time does he knock over the homemade basketball hoop - when he gets distracted talking to our next door neighbor Tom McGowan. Eventually, all three of my brothers are able to maneuver the car backwards into the driveway using Joe's unique parking method. My sisters and I refuse to attempt it and always make the boys do it for us.

Sadly, the Old Brown Station Wagon eventually meets its demise. Surprisingly, it's we girls who are the cause of its death. Mary is driving, and all five of us are talking away as Mary rolls along Capital Avenue toward home. Suddenly, smoke in big puffs escapes from under the hood of the car, and then, to our horror, we see flames erupt. Mary pulls over to the side of the road near the Pump and Pantry gas station, and we leap out into the cold night air.

"Mary!" I scream, "Run into the gas station and call Dad!"

Dad, to our dismay, is not home, but Mick comes racing the short way from home to our rescue. While we wait, the five of us stand in the cold staring mesmerized at the flames beneath the hood. Finally, we blink and shiver in our jackets.

"Probably a lot warmer in the car," Deb suggests.

Mick's eyes nearly pop out of his skull when he sees the five of us casually sitting inside the burning vehicle.

"What are you doing?" he screams.

Mary rolls down her window. "It's 17 degrees out there!" she shouts back. Fortunately, Mick convinces us - not very nicely - to remove ourselves from the car before it blows up.

But that proves to be the end of the road for the Old Brown Station Wagon.

For a long time we miss it, like a beloved family member. It's been our constant companion for years and years -  since Jeff was born and Tommy and Carry were still small enough to sit in the crack. No car has been more loved or more abused than the Old Brown Station Wagon.

Unless it will be the 1972 used Nova that Dad eventually purchases for my little sisters. It rusts so badly that the floor of the car disappears, and my sisters can see the pavement as they careen along. They drive that car until Terri turns the corner on Highway 281 and Capital Avenue, and the entire left front wheel disengages itself and rolls off down the highway.

But that's a story for another time.