As told by Marty (with added comments by Pamela)
Last updated 20-August-2002, any feedback about this page should be e-mailed to Marty (after you remove the leading "z" in the e-mail address).
Just as the Philly house was at one end of the spectrum, narrow and tall with no land; the Moreland Hills house was at the other end of the spectrum, rambling and curved with three acres. Did I mention gardening?
At first Pamela was taken aback by the size of the yard.
Nope - I was considering the possibilities!
She also had to give Pest a tour - a privilege for an indoors only cat.
The ship, the Celebration, had a fire in an electrical switching room about 18 hours out of Miami. All electrical power was lost for some 27 hours. (The toilets required electricity to flush!) Propulsion was lost. So, the ship was a drifting sewer for a couple of days. The cruise line's solution to the problem - why free beer and booze of course. We were really glad to see the U.S. Coast Guard cutter (ironically, number 911).
About a day and 1/2 after the fire, in the early AM, a rescue cruise ship arrived. The rescue ship, the Ecstasy, lowered its lifeboats and used them as ferry boats to bring us and our luggage across.
Jumping into the lifeboat was scary. Marty didn't happen to mention that by the time we got to go, in the next-to-last lifeboat, the swells were reaching 5 feet! Jumping from the lifeboat to the ramp at the Ecstasy was no fun either.
Once on the Ecstasy, the cruise line tried to kiss and make up. suddenly everything that they would normally have nickle-and-dimed us to death about was free. They gave us free staged photographs, fancy dinners, and more free drinks (on the way to one of their casinos, definitely not free).Speaking of casinos, Marty is not a gambler. He knows too much about the odds. I made him go play the slots just for the experience. He got $5-worth of quarters and started plunking them into a one-arm-bandit. Meanwhile a youngster who could not play was observing every move. Marty hit a $55 payoff after dropping six quarters. The youngster was excited. Marty, knowing the odds of additional success immediately cashed out and left. The youngster was crushed. Worse yet, we never got to the Carribean - the rescue ship just took us back to Miami.
Pamela wanted to make sure that Pest felt at home in Cleveland, not that she spoiled him or anything.
Hmmm, cat in one hand and wine in the other, what a life.
When Pamela wasn't consoling Pest, she had the yard and future gardens to think about and plan for...
Little did I know that the whole neighborhood, if not the whole state, is infested with flower and bud-eating deer!
Being a kind and caring sort, I gave Pamela a 3-gal pump sprayer for her birthday so she could "easily" spray various deer repellents on her plants. Some of them almost worked.
On July 4th, 1995 our lives got a bit turned upside down. We were cruising the yard when we heard kittens crying. We traced the sounds to a house across the street. That house was being renovated and was empty. Well, there was one kitten on the roof and another in the shrubs, crying back and forth.Marty climbed up and got the rooftop kitten down. I approached the other, but it was frightened and standoffish. But with only a very little encouragement they followed us home. We locked them in the screen porch and fed and watered them.
They were beautiful cats and we thought that they were simply lost. So we made and posted more than 50 "Cats Found" notices in the area. After a few days we realized that they had been dumped. So it was off to the vet with them and also time to name them. It was simple, Roofie for the one that was on the roof and Boo for the one that was frightened. Now Pamela, not realizing that calico cats are female, and fooled by the size of these kittens, assumed that they were male and used Rufy rather than Roofie. At the left, Roofie is enjoying Pamela's lap and a scratch. On the right, Boo is enjoying the view from the screened porch.
Well the kittens passed their tests and entered the house. They pretty quickly made it theirs. Poor Squeak just didn't want to play their lurk and pounce games.
There were other critters in the neighborhood who just didn't understand why they didn't get to come inside and be spoiled.
Marty and Pamela, well they just spoiled the newcomers as well as Pest and Squeak.
Pest didn't believe that for a minute (as he looked on with suspicion and disdain).
Pamela went to Australia for a visit in the spring of 1996. She visited with her sister Lyn and husband Linden and with their sons Cam and Brad.
I timed this visit to coincide with the centenary celebration of my one-room schoolhouse. It was lovely to see many of the people with whom I had gone to primary school. (images pending)
She visited with her Aunt Fay and with her Uncle Graham...
and with her Aunt Ilma and Uncle Peter. And then took a break from it all.
Marty was invited to lecture at the 1996 AAPM Summer School held at The University of British Columbia in Vancouver, BC, CA. We stayed in a dormitory for about six days and then spent a long weekend based at a motel and hiking in the North Vancouver area. It was beautiful!
After a day as a tourist at Victoria Island, I came back to the dorm and told Marty that we were going to retire there.
The UBC campus had gorgeous gardens including the rose garden I'm sitting in at the left. A campus trail led down to the bay? river? ocean? where I met some friendly natives.
That same day our walk took us to the campus museum of Native American Artifacts. Outside there were several totem poles. Inside there was a plethora of artifacts ranging from sculptures to tools to weavings, to... It was very impressive.
We drove North to one of the ski areas intending to hike there. But, we ran into a ranger who told us that the bears had not yet gone up the mountain. We changed plans. The ranger suggested another easy hike, further to the North, for middle-aged folks in sneakers. Canadians have a different definition of easy!!! The trail started decently enough, as a walk in the woods.
But then it got steeper, and steeper. Along the way, two Canadians ran past us up the trail wearing backpacks. Much later we made the summit, but not the one we were aiming for. It turned out that the guidebook, in describing the trails up this three-peaked "mountain," was a bit confused. We were aiming for the middle peak, but ended up on the distant, taller, peak.
Some of the "trail" required hauling oneself up along wire ropes anchored to nearly vertical rocks. I was tired!
The summit views were worth the climb. (Easy for him to say - we still had to get back down.) The clouds were high enough to provide shade without obstructing the view and we didn't get rained on much.
The trip down was "interesting." First it was only gravity that got me down, sometimes on my butt. Second, as we were going down the trail we encountered two children coming up. In an ever so condescending way we asked where their parents were. They answered just behind us. They were - a dad carrying a youngster on his back and a mom who was eight months pregnant! In conversation they told us that a few months ago they would have run up. As I said, Canadians have a different definition of easy!!!
The next day hills were out of the question, I had trouble with the motel stairs. Instead, we did walk-in-the-woods hiking. But now it really got ridiculous. Senior citizens were running past us, up the hills and down the hills. It turned out that a local Canadian senior running club regularly used these trails. Enough embarrassment for one trip, we went home. Pamela and I agreed, this Vancouver trip was one of the nicest ever. The venue was spectacular and the Canadians were superb hosts.
At least Roofie and Boo enjoyed it. I wished that I had remembered how to set off his pager.
In the spring of 1997 Pamela took a well deserved break from me and the cats and went to Paris to visit her friends Charlie B. and his wife Françoise D. for a few weeks. She had a ball, seeing museums, art gallerys, etc., and ice cream shops.
We then took him to a specialist, a veterinary oncologist, for more advanced treatments. Pest ended up having both chemo and radiation therapy. They helped him for a bit, but soon lost their effectiveness.
Trying to make his remaining days happy ones, we spent lots of time cuddling him and taking him to his favorite places in the house.
One day, as Pamela was carrying Pest down from an upstairs room, she slipped on the stairs and tumbled down 1/2 a flight to a landing. As she fell, she twisted to keep Pest safe, but hurt her knee and already sore back. (Her back didn't recover and in August 2000 she had back surgery. More on that later.)
During this time, and so quietly that we didn't at first notice, Squeak also became ill...
The ER kept her overnight and got her stabilized so we could bring her home. Poor Squeak, she looked so silly with the fur shaved off her ever-so-thin forelegs. She looked like she had a poodle-cut.
Just as we were doing for Pest, Squeak was carried to her favorite places and otherwise cuddled.
Pest continued to have our attention and affection as well.
It is now March, 1998. Pest no longer seemed to be responding to any of his treatments. We decided that at the next visit to the oncologist we would make the hard decision if the vet had nothing new to offer. The vet didn't, so the kindest act was to have Pest put to sleep. Meanwhile, Squeak seemed to be weakening, but slowly. We had arranged an appointment with her regular vet to see what could be done. Her visit took place the day after Pest was put to sleep. The vet's assessment was that she would only get worse and would suffer. So, Squeak was also put to sleep. These litter mates had been wonderful "family" for the nearly sixteen years they were with us. They were missed.
Now its April, 1998 and I was getting furry-cuddle deprived. Rufy and Boo were good cats, but not lap cats. Not entirely true, Boo - the bitch cat from hell - often claimed my lap. She just did it with her claws and jaws extended. I was determined to get a lap cat and anyway, two cats seemed like too few cats.
The Geauga Humane society, just a few miles from us, runs a very nice shelter. I started spending time there looking for a potential lap cat. A mother cat and litter were resident. Amongst that litter was one very active and friendly little orange and white guy with pink ears covered by some white fur. I staked a claim, but would have to wait until he was weaned.I kept visiting to check up on him. Other cats arrived in the shelter including a litter of kittens that had been dumped in a box at the side of a road (damn people!). They were adopted out including the runt - a skinny little black cat.
But on my last visit to check up on my reserved orange and white kitten, the black runt was back. I couldn't stand it - I took them both home.
Now the questions. What do we name them? Will Boo try to eat them?
The runt had already been named before I took him home, and I didn't want to confuse him, so he remained - Ollie. Otherwise, we were having lots of troubles finding a name for the orange and white charmer. Eventually Marty suggested Nemo (meaning "no name") and it stuck.
Regarding Boo - we just kept them apart for now.
The kittens got a lot of handling, a lot of socializing. And a lot of protection from Boo!
When they came home, Nemo was five weeks old and Ollie was thought to be 11 weeks old. Regardless, Nemo tried to do everything Ollie did. It was hilarious to watch.
The kittens used Marty's legs as a battle ground.
Looks like Pamela got her cuddle cat.
This was serious cat socialization. Also I had to carefully introduce Nemo to Rufy. Cuddling just wasn't on my mind.
During that meeting Marty, Larry R, and I were chatting. Larry is another Medical Physicist and very enthusiastic pilot who talks flying every chance he gets. Marty once again mentioned his long-time interest in flying and observed that he never had the time and cash at the same time. Then I stupidly said, "better do it before your reflexes are completely shot." I remember the quote as "better do it before you run out of time." Well, the next May, Marty started flying lessons. The May after that he purchased a plane, a four-seat Grumman Tiger. I should have kept my mouth shut :-)
Look for Pamela under the yellow arrow.
There was a big upside to Marty's flying. We met some wonderful folks. They especially included Rob and Ann L. Rob is also providing the server space for these pages (the rob.com part of the URL). We've had many fun evenings with them and many interesting games of Canasta. Goes to show that you can find good friends in the strangest places.
She took this photograph which includes her very, very, good friend Lynn P., 2nd from the left.
Additional volunteer activities included landscaping at the local Ronald McDonald's House (a health-care facility for very ill children).
Pamela's rehabilitation required that she wear a plastic clamshell all day every day for three months. So her friends gave her a bell to summon me for her needs. They also gave her a cane that she could use to thrash me when needed (usually after a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle wisecrack).Her friends also started making analogies to Wonder Woman - but they didn't get thrashed. They also gave her a Wonder Woman (Linda Carter) photograph that ended up hanging 'round the neck of Pamela's dress dummy (which now wears the plastic clamshell).
Anyway, notice that rehab or not she's out in her gardens!
On February 15, 2001 Pamela's pain was so intense that I took her to the Emergency Room. For the very first time a blood-in-the-stool test came back positive. This prompted a change in the attitude of the physicians. They got her into radiology pretty quickly for x-ray studies to look for a bowel obstruction. They saw one and she was immediately scheduled for surgery. I went to my office to wait.
Some five or six hours later the surgeon called me to tell me that a cancerous mass had been removed from her intestines where the small and large bowel meet and that there were already many liver mets, too many to resect the liver. It was stage IV colon cancer, the most advanced stage.
As far back as 1997 Marty wanted me to have a screening colonoscopy. I didn't, trusting the more convenient blood-in-the-stool tests instead. Marty never once threw it up in my face that I didn't do it his way. We have since learned that the blood-in-the-stool tests have a roughly 15% false negative rate which can mean a death sentence for some people.
There is a lesson here for all of us. Once you get to that certain age, screw the blood-in-the-stool tests, get a screening colonoscopy!
The balloons came home with me. Boo, who loves to chew ribbons, assumed they were for her. Marty rigged a weight and extra long string to let the balloons and ribbons float above Boo's reach. She was smarter, she just pulled the string down by using a combination of teeth and paws until she could get the ribbons in her mouth. Cats are not dumb! Nemo watched and laughed.
Pamela's sister Lyn came to visit in the spring. They stood still for one posed shot and then got goofy. At least the killer rubber plant didn't get them from behind.
Lyn got to meet some of our friends. Here, Olga T. consults on the cooking and her husband Misha C. and she exhibit that mad Russian scientist look.
One day Pamela, Lyn and I drove up to the hangar at Cuyahoga County Airport (CGF) to visit my plane. I had a handheld radio along and was listening to tower communications. My friend Rob L. was about to take off in his Tiger. Lyn and I got out of the car to watch his takeoff. Rob chose a steep departure. I think that image convinced Lyn to not even think of going up. So we just got goofy with the camera and put Pamela in the pilot's seat and Lyn in the right seat. Lyn had been telling Marty all along that she gets motion sick and would likely barf if he took her up. Somehow, good sense prevailed and we all stayed on the ground that day.
Pamela received some chemo treatments during Lyn's visit. Lyn was right there with her in the treatment room.
Pamela just wouldn't let her cancer or her treatments hold her down.She and friend Olga C. went to a bird sanctury for a hike and some bird watching...
Or, one could say that desperate times require desperate measures :-)
Between over planning, getting us to the airport, pre-flighting the plane, flying down, landing, securing the plane, arranging ground transport, and thinking about doing it all in reverse, Marty got more tired than me. But I enjoyed the day.
We were invited to the June wedding of the daughter of Pamela's dear friend Lynn P. Pamela got a nice new dress for the occasion.There was a Marty-clothing crisis. The reception was to be held in a Country Club. There would be lots of well dressed folks there. It was no place for a physicist's outfit. So we went on an expedition into Marty's closet. The first thing we did was to put his first-wife wedding-suit (polyester, ugh) into the Goodwill bag. Much to my chagrin, we found a suit, new in 1987, that fit and was suitable. Expedition successful I guess.
A long-time friend of Pamela's, Petra N, a medical oncologist from The Neatherlands, also managed a visit.
Petra attended one of my chemo treatments. In The Neatherlands the doctors do the treatments so she is very, very, familiar with process and procedure. I thought she was going to strangle someone on my behalf!
Charlie B. and Françoise D. came to visit from Paris. Well, not just to see us. They were in the US and Canada for meetings that Charlie had to attend and arranged to come through Cleveland.
It happened that during their visit Marty was already intending to go to an American Yankee Association (AYA) fly-in at Burke Lakefront Airport (BKL). Very much at Pamela's instigation the four of us piled into the Tiger and off we flew. This was sort of silly as the airports are just 11 miles apart. To make it interesting, we flew westward from CGF over The Cleveland Clinic, over the baseball field (Jacobs field), just south of Cleveland's "skyscrapers," then northwest over the Cuyahoga River, then eastward on the north side of the skyscrapers and over the football stadium to land at BKL. About 10 Grumman aircraft showed up for the fly-in. Hey, that submarine in the picture never got off the ground. What gives? Patience...So, what does one do at a fly-in? Talk flying and eat, in this case at Hornslowers the restaurant on a barge. Rob L, one of the organizers, had cleverly taken one of the gate keepers from the USS Cod exhibit for a flight. Next thing you know, the fly-in folks got a tour of the submarine. Charlie and Françoise had quite a day (and they won the (no prize) award for the most distance traveled to the fly-in :-) Ann L, center right, was co-organizer for the fly-in.
Later in August Larry and Anne R. came to visit, flying here in Larry's Tiger. Larry is the pilot who got Pamela to egg me on to take flying lessons. They stayed for a delightful long weekend. We even got to go to dinner with Rob and Ann L.
Poor wives, three pilots, three Tiger owners, three men. You can imagine the dinner conversation.
Being there early, we decided to go over the river and through the woods to the outdoor setting for the service (in front of the Theater Arts building). We ended up helping to set up the chairs. But I'm not sure that anyone was doing it accurately enough for that physicist and father of the bride, Palmer :-)
The reception would be held in the lobby of the building. A guest of honor, not pictured here, was the family golden retriever, Strider. She was a very well behaved pooch.
Pamela got to wear her new dress again, and I wore that same old (and only) suit.
It was so nice to be with these friends again. And so nice to see their lovely daughter so happy.
That's Karen, mother of the bride, with me in both photographs.
What you can't see is Palmer's authentic Lindsey (his mother's maiden name) tartan kilt! It was very much in keeping with the evening.
After a time, all the fun and excitement got to Pamela and she had to sit down for a while.
This wedding had a morning after. The guests were invited to breakfast. Then we sort of wandered over to the Theater Arts building where we participated in the teardown and cleanup.
The bride and groom, having left the reception on their bicycles the night before, showed up at the breakfast and showed up at the cleanup. It was very much a family and friends mutual effort and party. A very good time was had by all.
Less than a full week after returning from Iowa City, we hosted a gathering at our house for folks who worked with Marty and for a few other friends. There was a small glitch in the plans. The caterer canceled on Thursday for a Saturday function. Somehow we muddled through.Few pictures were taken, but I did manage to capture Ann and Rob L. of flying and web-server fame. On seeing this, Ann reminded me that "women don't like to have pictures shown of them eating." I had goofed again.
OK, I admit it, I was tired. Getting chemo, running around the country, and getting things together for the gathering was a bit too much. I needed that beer!
In some perverse way, it felt good to be helping him for a change.
Her pain was becoming more and more difficult to manage and on December 12 she decided to stop treatments and opted for palliative care.
Otherwise, Ollie took over our bed and Nemo took over the whole house. There is just no way to get away from it, cats rule.
Notice the physicists' uniform - flannel shirt and blue jeans.
Marty was a real good sport about this.
Pamela's primary aid, Beth S, was terrific; very skilled and very compassionate. Here she has just gotten Pamela ready to go to the Clinic for some x-ray exams.
Marty was a pretty damn good aid as well - but he couldn't do it all himself.
Pamela knew that her trip to the Cleveland Clinic for x-ray exams on January 31st could result in her being admitted. It was not something she looked forward to. Rather an understatement!
Pamela's body became tolerant of her pain medications and she had to be switched to different drugs. As part of this switch she was heavily sedated starting about February 16th. I spent a lot of time sitting with her, talking to her, and holding her hand. Pamela grew weaker and weaker and at about 9:15 PM EST the evening of Monday February 18th she simply, and peacefully, stopped breathing.
The only times she acted otherwise were when the pain from her cancer became overwhelming. But those episodes were thankfully few and far between, and were also thankfully very short-lived.
As you read this I ask you to remember the good times, the vibrant and happy Pamela, the joy she brought to every occasion, and to lift a glass, real or virtual, in celebration of her life.
Again, my thanks to all both near and far away who have put their own lives aside when needed to provide either physical comfort or a willing ear.
Now we've come full circle. Again, thank you for visiting these pages to remember me. Perhaps take note from what I've learned. Don't look back, don't feel regrets, let go of old resentments, and appreciate that there is always something to look forward to.
Unknown to those making the arrangements, the weeping cherry was one of Pamela's favorite trees. She had selected one for the tiny garden in front of our Philadelphia home. She would have been pleased.
