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.
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."
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.
"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.
"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.
"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'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. |
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.
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