Sometimes I wonder why I have reconnected so much with the
cards. I played as a teen until I found
BBW 1.0 in the early 90s. But now, even
after enjoying the completion of an old BBW project with my son, picking up the
cards is comforting. Blogging about the
games and reconnecting with the heroes of my youth while expressing a little
creativity, humor and imagination is somehow therapeutic. It's an escape from reality, for a little
while.
Stuart Scott's passing has touched us all. Many of us looked at the line under
his picture (1965-2015) and thought, "That's about my age." Losing a young, well known and well connected
celebrity affects us all. But it has
affected me in another way beyond losing a broadcaster I liked.
Those who know me personally, would tell you I am an
extremely private person. I'm
introverted to a fault. The number of truly close friends that I
confide in, and share any personal information with, can be counted on one
hand. You could actually count them on
your thumbs. That's not to say I
consider myself unfriendly or unsocial. I have many friends and people I like,
but very few get inside that inner circle of confidence and trust.
In September of 2013, my wife became ill at one of our
son's baseball tournaments. It started
slowly. She was sick on Thursday night
and worse on Friday. We thought it was a
stomach virus. She suffered through the
games on Saturday and Sunday, but by Sunday night she was getting bad. On Monday, we ended up in the Emergency Room
and told she had appendicitis. No
problem. A quick appendectomy and all
would be well. They are doctors. They know what they are doing.
My thoughts returned to years earlier when my daughter was
playing softball in Chattanooga ,
TN Somerset , Kentucky
Post surgery, the doctor told me all went well, and she
was in recovery. He told me about a
small "stone" that was on the end of the appendix. It had him puzzled and he had obviously never
seen anything like that before, but he wasn't worried. He was a doctor. He knew what he was doing.
During her first post-surgical office visit, the pathology
results were back. He used the term
"growth", but assured us it was not "cancer" and it was
nothing to worry about. He was a
doctor. He knew what he was doing. He was going on vacation.
The next visit was with his partner, since he was out of
town. The partner used words like
"tumor" and "benign".
My eyes widened. Both surgeons
were looking at the same pathology report.
They were doctors. They knew what
they were doing. They were also
inconsistent.
The following appointments resulted in more confusion and
inconsistency. Finally, they settled on
a story. It was a tumor, but was
benign. These things are "slow
growing" and "do not spread rapidly". The proper treatment (removal by surgery) had
been done. She needed to do nothing for
five years and then have a colonoscopy.
If by some odd chance, it had spread, it could be fixed then. They were doctors. I was starting to question the rest.
We go to church with the Chief Medical Officer of the
hospital. I spoke with him and he agreed
to take a look at her chart and records to reassure me things were fine. That caused some heat when the CMO started looking over another surgeon's records. Our family doctor is a lifelong friend, not
just a physician. He was a
friend before he was our doctor. He's also one of the thumbs. He, the CMO and I all
started researching from different perspectives over the next week, and all came to the same conclusion.
This was bad and experts were needed.
Our family doctor scheduled a conference with an
oncologist at Vanderbilt and called me with the details. The night we got there we heard new
words. Rare. Aggressive.
Malignant. We were referred to their top surgical oncologist. He told us she was
famous. Every time the Tumor Board met,
she was a topic of discussion and they were using every resource they had. Many people have achieved fame in Nashville
Some in this group that I communicate with a little outside
of the page, have me as a Facebook friend and may have seen what I posted to my
wall last month on our 27th anniversary:
Sometimes a napkin is just a
napkin. We use it and throw it in the
trash. We have no thoughts of it. Then there is that time you are sitting in a
restaurant with your wife when your family doctor calls and gives you directions
and appointment times for Vanderbilt Ingram Cancer Center for her first
oncologist appointment, and the only thing you have to write on is a
napkin. You grab it, hand shaking, and
you write. That napkin contains the
details of where and when you will meet with the physicians that hold your
wife's life in their hands as she fights a very rare and very malignant
goblet-cell carcinoid tumor. That napkin
you keep. You also pray and you trust
God for strength in what you are about to endure.
One year ago today, on our 26th
wedding anniversary, my darling wife had surgery that we hope saved her
life. In the days leading up to surgery,
we continued to pray and trust together.
On the morning of surgery, we prayed and trusted, and then they took her
away from me. During the surgery, while
she was gone, I prayed and tried to trust.
Prayer came easy, but trusting without her there was hard. That night I spent watching her sleep and
thanking God that the surgical results had been good. On that anniversary night after surgery, she
tried to eat some JELL-O with mixed results. I don't remember what, if anything, I
had. It was unimportant. I had her with me. I could pray, and I could trust.
In the weeks and months following, we
continued to pray and trust. Six months
later, the first set of scans came back clear.
No sign of cancer spread! Praise
the Lord! In a couple of weeks, we will
return for the second round of post-op scans.
They'll continue to watch her for the next few years. With each return trip we make, those feelings
of fear and concern will likely resurface.
We do not know how those results will turn out, but God does. So, we continue to do the only things we can
- pray and trust.
All this time, the napkin has hung by our door. I look at it almost daily. I remember the day I wrote it. I remember the days that followed. I've thought about throwing it away at times, but somehow, it seemed wrong for it to just be thrown in the trash like a common napkin. The napkin itself isn't anything special, but the information on it was. The fear and worry it represented were real. But the mercy, grace and power displayed by God to persevere through this ordeal has also been real, and was bigger than my failings and weaknesses.
Tonight, on the one year anniversary
of her surgery, and the 27th anniversary of our wedding, we had a much better
dinner than last year. But before we
went out, we burned the napkin. It had
served it's purpose and served it well.
I wasn't sure what she would order for dessert tonight, but I knew it
wouldn't be JELL-O.
APBA is a release to which I can escape. The cards and players take me to a familiar
and safe time and place. I'm not into
PS4, so the fact that my son and I do it together makes it very special too. Writing about the games and sharing, even
with the humor and silliness, is "like gravy on a biscuit, it's all
good".
