Retirement

My son, Dean, who was retiring from the Army with thirty years of service, was expecting the date to be set sometime in April.   I was expecting the date of my first consolidation at the same time.  I had an appointment with Dr. Sprague and her intern, Dr. Chakra.  Chakra is his first name but everyone in the hospital calls him Dr. Chakra.  He is from Nepal.  I have always wanted to attend Dean's retirement ceremony because I had missed his father's due to our divorce.  I had also missed my father's retirement because we were stationed in Germany at the time.  Dr. Sprague seemed to sense my deep desire and decided to delay the consolidation, making it possible for me to go to Pennsylvania!  She scheduled it for May 3rd.  She also decided to remove my pick and to have a port installed for the remainder of my treatment so I wouldn't have to worry with flushing the pick daily.  Dean's retirement was set for April 20th and I flew via Southwest to Pennsylvania on the 18th.  I am so appreciative of Dr. Sprague's sensitivity to the emotional needs of her patients. 

The retirement ceremony was attended by Missy, her two daughters (my granddaughters), and her most recent boyfriend, Lee; Bobbie, Dean's ex-wife and their three children, Travis, Charlie, and Kady (my grandchildren); Dean's former mother-in-law, Kay McClelland; and Chris and Jim Chapman, a classmate of my husband's and the person for whom Dean was named!  Dean's due date to be born was very close to the end of February and it was a leap year, the day of Jim's birthday.  Both Jim and Chuck had had a few drinks and Chuck agreed that if Dean were born on leap year day, Dean would be named after Jim.  Dean Chapman Stodter instead of Dean Travis Stodter, Dean being the name of his maternal Grandfather and Travis, the name of his Great-Grandfather.  As luck would have it, Dean was born on leap year day!  He was named and christened Dean Chapman Stodter. 

There were many of  Dean's co-workers, fellow classmates and friends present.  After several presentations, Dean received the Ancient Order of Saint Barbara, which is rarely awarded and a great honor to receive as an Artillery man; the Legion of Merit Medal; and a Certificate from President Barak Obama thanking him for his thirty years of service.  Then Dean was given the microphone.  One minute for one year!  He had put together a wonderful slide show which showed his Great Grandfather, Col Ezra Stodter, a graduate of West Point, and his family; a slide of his Grandfather, Col. Charles Stowe Stodter, a graduate of MIT--his brother John was the graduate of West Point; and a wonderful slide of his father, Col. Charles Stowe Stodter, Jr.; and a slide of his Grandfather for whom he is named, LTC Vonual Dean Beavers.  He also showed a slide of me and acknowledged my influence!  Dean recognized everyone and paid tribute to them all.  150 years of service!  Everyone applauded enthusiastically at the end of the speech.  Dean was "retired!"

Part of my desire to be at the retirement was because I felt that it was, in a way, my "retirement" too.  My father was a member of the National Guard when I was born, later to fight in WWII, and to serve for 33 years.  I married a young lieutenant who was a career Army officer, had a son who was a career Army officer and had three grandchildren who had served, two of whom were wounded.  Now I am no longer a "dependent!"  I am still eligible for medical coverage, the commisary and PX rights but I am without a "sponsor!"  It seems strange.  I have lived as a civilian for 30 years but have never identified myself as one!

Afterward, we all gathered at a cafe run by the Menonites who very graciously, closed the cafe to other customers and prepared a delicious spread of hors d'ouevre.  Everyone was in a festive mood and there was much laughter and good conversation.

At last, it was over!  Everyone poured into the parking lot and drove to their homes or hotels.  A good time was had by all and I was still standing! 

Rearranging the Kitchen

Cheryl, my daughter came to Massachusetts from Tucson, Arizona, the last week of February to oversee my well-being and recovery from leukemia.  Melissa, her younger sister, and Dean, her older brother had covered the 26 days I spent in Tufts Medical Center on the oncology unit.  My oldest son, Chuck, who lives in Emporia, Kansas, teaches at a juvenile detention facility year round, has faithfully called almost every evening to check-in on my status and to tell me that he loves me.  Missy spent her spring vacation with me, and Dean, a colonel in the Army, had taken leave time to be with me.  I am very grateful for the time and attention they have given me.  It has been an overwhelming reponse to a medical condition that I never suspected having! 

I wish that I was organized enough to write about my experiences as they happened.  I'm not, but I have kept a list of all the things I want to blog about.  And I hope that the readers of my blog will be able to understand and make a coherent whole from the many pieces.  Today I want to blog about the reorganization of my kitchen by my daughter Cheryl!  It is an overwhelming undertaking!

I think some background information is necessary.  I have completed my initial treatment and did very well.  Since then I have had my first "consolidation," a six day period of chemotherapy.  I did well but predictably my white blood cell count faltered.  I was given two infusions and rallied.  Once again I was pronounced as doing well and my second "consolidation" is scheduled for June 4th.  I became 78 years old on my birthday, 24th April 2012.  Although I am doing very well, I tire easily and my sense of balance is frequently a problem.  I am most frustrated by the phenomenon known as "chemo-brain"!  The inability to remember certain words, names, and information.  I forgot the name of a friend and fellow church-goer whom I have known for nearlly 30 years!  It took two days before I recalled it!  The condition is supposed to improve with time.  So age and chemo-brain conspire to reduce me to complete helplessness at times. 

Admittedly my kitchen was a mess.  I live in a small condo and there isn't much room.  Cheryl decided to move all of the food items to the kitchen and make space for them by moving all of the pots and pans paraphanalia to the landing on the way to the basement.  In the process of empytying
nearly all the shelves to the middle of the floor, it was discovered that I not only have an excess of food but also have an excess of kitchen utensils and appliances!  And I do not remember buying most of them!  It's as if I've been in a black-out for years!  Do I laugh or do I cry?  I felt like doing both!  We have three piles: things to keep, things to be thrown away and things to be taken to a thrift shop.  I have read about older persons tending to hang onto food items long past their expiration date but buying appliances when you already have them must be a sign of something very unpleasant.  It was humiliating!

The kitchen is taking shape once again and all the excess will soon be removed.  It has taken two days to finish the project!  I think the prayer of the day will be to keep it simple and to not duplicate.  And to remember that my daughter has rescued me from a mess that I could not have cleaned up.

Coping with illness, growing older and a computer.

During the discernment process I had chosen to meditate on the above scripture concerning Abraham’s wife, Sarah, who was blessed by God and gave birth to a child when she was “too old” to have a child. There are many ways of bringing forth new life and that was my prayer. To bring forth new life in old age.

It is still my prayer. And this blog is somehow part of gestation. I am awaiting the birth of new life. What form that new life will take I haven’t a clue. Meanwhile I am pursuing the path that I had hoped to pursue as a deacon. I am involving myself in additional interfaith activities. And I am exploring the experience of growing older and what it means to be “too old.”
                                                                                                           Excerpt from a previous blog.


I became ill on Halloween with a case of bronchitis.  On Thanksgiving I had to decline a visit to my second son who always invited any family members who were able to gather for the holiday.  By Christmas I was worn out when a granddaughter visited me and I required a nap everyday to function.  I rallied for a few occasions in January but was anxious for January 30th when I had an appointment to see my primary care physician.  Just before my appointment I broke out with an allergic reaction and momentarily lost all sense of balance, tumbling at the top of the stairs.  I was very frightened.  

I saw my doctor and told him my tale of woe.  He ordered blood work for me and since it required  fasting, I went in the following morning.  Two hours later he called and asked me if I could find a ride to Tufts Medical Center for an appointment.  He said that he had conferred with two other doctors and that their concensus of opinion was that there was an 80% probability of my having leukemia!  I was stunned and shocked beyond words and scared.

I was 77 years old and lived in a condo alone.  Most of my friends are older and don't drive out of town and my younger acquaintenances were all working.  I finally reached my priest--The Reverend Karen Ann Campbell--for whom I had worked eight and a half years--and she drove me into Boston and I was hospitalized.  I really thought I was going to die.

From this point on my memories will be scattered.  I am not finished with my treatment yet and I am still suffering from "chemo brain!"   I spent the month of February in the hospital and did very well but I am returning in a week for my first "consolidation."  A period of six days receiving a lighter dose of chemotherapy to be followed by a second "consolidation" approximately one month later.

Love of Dancing

I have always loved to dance.  As a child I dreamed of being a ballerina but it was not possible because I had rheumatic fever.  My heart was misplaced in my chest cavity or maybe enlarged.  I don't remember.  I just knew that I required a lot of rest and many trips to the hospital and that I couldn't play very actively.  Sometimes I required several months of bedrest and was entertained by my books, especially Robert Louis Stevenson.  "When I was sick and lay-a-bed..." and my favorite, "The world is so full of a number of things, I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings."  Then when I was about 12 sulfa was discovered and a miracle of recovery occurred.  My heart returned to its normal size and its normal place in my chest.  I was cautioned against overexerting myself and told "to take it easy."


It was too late to begin training as a ballerina but I still loved to dance.  My Daddy taught me the two-step and I know that I never had lessons but by the time I was in college I was a very good ballroom dancer and chose my dates accordingly.  In my third year of college I even managed to get hired at the Arthur Murray Dance Studio.  I also dated a boy who had studied dancing for several years and was a wonderful dancer.  In my fouth year of college I said good-bye to my fledgling career and married a young lieutenant.  Then followed 25 years of dancing at parties and fortunately military officers were wonderful about dancing with several women.  I met several men who were great partners.


I attended the ballet whenever possible and have loved the music written for the ballet.  Swan Lake being my all time favorite.  I have several times taken ballet classes for adults as a means to exercise.


I even learned to ski when I was dancing with a ski instructor who pointed out to me that skiing was a lot like dancing and I should be very good at it.  His casual remark instilled in me the confidence that I needed and I did become a good skier.


And then, 32 years ago my marriage came to an end.  And I stopped dancing.  Not deliberately, but I was distracted by other things.


Now it occurs to me that I gave up the one abiding love of my life.
 
Throughout our life we make choices, not always realizing what those choices will result in.  This morning I wonder how many things in my life have I given up?  Is it too late to reclaim some of them?

The Week of November 6, 2011

If you wish to be a writer, write.  Epictetus

The highlight of this week was an invitation to speak at Merrimac College by Rabbi Margaret Frisch Klein who was conducting a service remembering Kristallnacht.  The following is what I said... 

My first experience came in Germany when I was 13 years old.  My mother and I sailed into Bremerhaven in January of 1947 to join my father, an American Army Officer who was stationed in Ludwigsburg.

My initial impression was that everything was as it must have been at the end of the war—only the bodies had been removed.  The bombed out buildings and the piles of rubble were not yet cleared.

It was also my initial impression of Dachau when I saw the camp.  Only the bodies had been removed.  The barracks and the ovens stood in stark contrast to the quaint villages of the lush Bavarian countryside.  The walls of the barracks were covered with scribbling.  I was 13 and I lacked the ability to fully comprehend the horror of the Holocaust.

Dachau was the first Nazi concentration camp in Germany, established on 10 March 1933,  It was built on the outskirts of the town of Dachau, approximately 12 miles north of Munich.  It was the model and training camp for all other SS-organized camps.  In the course of Dachau’s history, at least 160,000 prisoners passed through the main camp and 90,000 through the branches.  The record are incomplete but they indicate that at least 32,000 inmates died there, some from malnutrition, disease, and physical oppression.  Numberless more were transported to the extermination camps in Poland.

Dachau was the first and most important camp at which German doctors and scientists set up laboratories to perform medical experiments on involuntary inmates.  Because of these experiments throughout the duration of the war, Dachau was one of the most notorious camps.  After the war, the doctors and scientists working at Dachau were tried at Nurenberg in the "Doctor's Trial" and seven received death sentences.

Many years later, I married an Army officer and went to Germany again.  He and I went to Dachau and it had been transformed into a Memorial.  Although it was a very impressive memorial I thought that it might have been more effective had it been left as it was when I first saw it.  My initial experience still haunts me and whenever I think of Dachau, it is the first impression that I recall.

I think my father wanted to see Dachau because his Division, the 45^th National Guard Division out of Oklahoma, participated in the liberation of Dachau.  My father was not with his unit at that time because he had been wounded by shrapnel exploding in his helmet, and had been returned to the States.

The third, and last time, that I visited Dachau I was with my daughter who had converted to Judaism and married a Jewish man, and my two two beautiful granddaughters, Adina and Ariela, who were 10 and 8 years old.  We didn't speak much during the tour.  As I watched my granddaughters I thought of all the innocent children who had been killed.  It still is a memory that haunts me.

I thank Merrimack College’s Certificate of Study in Jewish Christian Relations, Reverend Gordon White, my priest at the time, and my good friend, Rabbi Margaret Klein, for teaching me and instilling in me a deep love of my Jewish roots.

                                                  *************

As I lit a Remembrance candle, Rabbi Margaret, called me a "Righteous Gentile," a very great honor.  She also made very kind remarks on her FaceBook site and Rabbi Neil Kominsky, with whom I had participated in an interfaith discussion group for several years before his retirement replied, "Somewhere between a Righteous Gentile and an Honorary Jew!" 

Too Old? (Published four years ago)

Sarah is not my name. It is the name I have chosen to use on my blog. I have chosen it for a reason.

9 They said to him, "Where is your wife Sarah?" And he said, "There, in the tent." 10 Then one said, "I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son." And Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him. 11 Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. 12 So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, "After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?" 13 The Lord said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh, and say, "Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?' 14 Is anything too wonderful for the Lord? At the set time I will return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son." Genesis 18:9-14

Last summer I was thrilled to be accepted into the process of discernment for Ordination to Deacon in the Episcopal Church. The first question I asked of the committee was “Am I too old?” and they assured me I was not. I completed the process and received a beautiful letter of recommendation to go forward in the ordination process. Six weeks later I was called and informed that the Church had changed canon law at National Convention (in 2006) making 72 the mandatory age of retirement for deacons. I was disqualified before I got out of the starting gate! I was very disappointed and confused about the “call” that I felt. I was “too old” after all.

During the discernment process I had chosen to meditate on the above scripture concerning Abraham’s wife, Sarah, who was blessed by God and gave birth to a child when she was “too old” to have a child. There are many ways of bringing forth new life and that was my prayer. To bring forth new life in old age.

It is still my prayer. And this blog is somehow part of gestation. I am awaiting the birth of new life. What form that new life will take I haven’t a clue. Meanwhile I am pursuing the path that I had hoped to pursue as a deacon. I am involving myself in additional interfaith activities. And I am exploring the experience of growing older and what it means to be “too old.”

Old age comes from God, old age leads on to God, old age will not touch me only so far as He wills.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Ode to My Hands (first published 4 years ago)

Hands are the heart's landscape.  Pope John Paul II

As a young woman my hands were small, slender and smooth.
Now my hands are looking old, wrinkled with visible veins.

I fell several years ago, my hands reaching out to break the fall, and broke my wrist so severely that my hand became swollen and I could not use it for many weeks. After the pins and then the cast were removed, I spent several months in therapy with a hand specialist. With her expertise and encouragement and exercise I eventually recovered the full use of my hand much to the surprise of my orthopedic surgeon and my therapist. They did not expect me to regain full use.

Since that time I have been mindful of my hands. They took care of my children when my children were babies and held their hands, as they grew older. They have held the hands of my grandchildren and now, my great-granddaughter. They have washed many dishes (I actually married before the advent of the dishwasher), folded many clothes and fixed broken toys. They have administered first aid to my children and held the hands of my family and friends when they needed comforting.

My hands have been blessed with creativity. They have embroidered, knitted, done needlepoint, smocked and quilted. My hands have drawn and painted, cut and pasted many craft projects, held a camera and taken photographs. My hands have enjoyed the sensual feel of fabrics and have sewn clothes for me and for my children. They sewed and beaded a quilted chuppah for my daughter's wedding. They have made many gifts for the people I love.

My hands have provided me the pleasure of playing the piano. My hands have kneaded dough, baked cookies and cooked for my family and friends and guests. They have arranged flowers and pulled weeds and planted bulbs.

My hands tickled the backs of my husband and my children. My hands held their heads when they were sick and throwing up. My hands have petted many dogs that I have loved.

My hands have held the chalice, offering “the blood of Christ, the cup of salvation” during communion. I have laid my hands on others to pray for their healing.

My hands touched my father as he lay dying and touched my mother as she lay dying.

My hands have worn my engagement ring and my wedding band, the diamond ring my parents gave me when I finally graduated from college at the age of 40, and all the beautiful rings that my father made for me.

My hands are no longer smooth but they have served me well and deserve respect and appreciation. They have been the instruments of my soul. I pray that I will never take them for granted as I used to do.
May the graciousness of the Lord our God be upon us;
Prosper the work of our hands; prosper our handiwork. Psalm 90:17