Ohio update

Grandpa Beck grew up with two brothers and a sister. His sister, Mildred, who I visited in Mt. Vernon in December, is up at the Cleveland Clinic, where she will have thyroid surgery today. His two brothers, Loren and Ronald, have been living in Outlook Manor, a nursing home near St. Ann’s Hospital in Westerville. Loren, who left his Delaware County home after his wife died, has dementia. Ronald was a wealthy engineer for the auto industry in Detroit. But he was estranged from the rest of his family, his wife died a number of years ago – until Loren went up about 10 years ago and rescued him. He was rich, alone, and dealing with behavioral health issues. Although Grandpa has four stepdaughters and many adoring grandchildren on our side of the family, Mildred has just one son and one grandson and Loren has just one adopted daughter, Jeannie, who we visited in Marietta some 15 years ago.

Ronald died early in the morning Thursday. Grandpa, Aunt Sandy, and Uncle Don had visited Loren and him this weekend.

But only Jeannie was around Thursday morning at the nursing home, as Aunt Sandy – out of sick leave from helping take care of Aunt June – was in the hospital in Marysville with Uncle Don, who was experiencing heart problems earlier this week, on top of other health problems. Sons and daughter-ins-law on Don's side of the family were keeping an eye on Grandpa in Don and Sandy's absence - a role I may take on for a few days later this summer. Later Friday Sandy took Grandpa, who already sees through only one eye, to the opthamologist - substituting for Don, who usually takes him.

Before leaving for the hospital, Sandy asked by e-mail for prayers for June. June goes for throat cancer treatment five times a week. But doctors say she has less than a year to live and Sandy says she seems a little depressed. June will find out on Saturday, June 20, whether her tumor has been shrinking and - by extension - whether treatment will continue (yes if yes; no if no). Sandy asked for prayers for daughter Diana too.

Son Dustin receives Supplemental Security Income checks and lives by himself in an apartment in Lancaster.

Ronald’s body is being cremated and family members have not yet scheduled a memorial service at a funeral home in Westerville. Click here for a tiny bit more information: http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/dispatch/obituary.aspx?n=ronald-d-beck&pid=128029688

We’re planning to see another family members who’s been fighting health problems, Grandma Mary, at a surprise 40th anniversary party for one pair of Stephanie’s uncle and aunts (Marvin and Pat) back up in Mt. Vernon late Saturday afternoon. I’ll hope to get a chance to watch or listen to the Belmont Stakes during the party. Go, Mine That Bird!

Lots of folks could use prayer in our family, but among them: Jeannie, Loren, Mildred, Grandpa (Marston), Don, Sandy, June, Diana, Dustin, Barb, Grandma Mary, Marvin, Pat, Bobby, Terree, Bob, and Nancy.

Ronald’s life and death also remind us of people’s struggles with behavioral health issues: from the musician whose story we watched last night in “The Soloist” to our friend Brant to close family members (including our son).

Ronald also reminds us of the specter of growing old and sick with no one around – something we fear if we have no more kids since we don’t know if Vincent will be a “dutiful son,” Stephanie is an only child, and I only have one sister, brother-in-law, and nephew who we aren’t able to spend a lot of time with. Koreans traditionally expect descendants to visit their graves – this is something that my first stepmother June, when she was very ill, feared would not happen – and, if our bodies or ashes are buried at Concord Cemetery or elsewhere – it’s hard to imagine who would do this regularly if at all.

-- Perry

Late May update

Vincent also had an appointment with the psychiatrist that ultimately prescribed medication for him, which we got to late enough today that we had to reschedule it for the end of the month. Last time Dr. Knox said the medication he's currently on has enough side effects that he can't be on it forever. So now - at the end of June - she'll decide whether to try a new medication or have him go cold turkey. Since he's now 18, there's a little bit of ambiguity now as to whether we should be going in with him to speak with the psychiatrist and what happens if he really doesn't want to keep taking medication. The court order said he must keep on with counseling and medication unless behavioral health providers say it’s OK to quit. (It's over in Jeffersonville, IN, so maybe Stephanie and Vincent will go next month and not be late like Vincent and I were.)

Mom went to the orthopedic doctor and got an X-ray. The doctor is sending her for an MRI, recommending focusing on posture and taking hourly breaks to do back exercises, and pooh-poohing physical therapy or chiropractic medicine. They did not talk about surgery, which Mom isn’t enthusiastic about. Mom knows there are several things going on – back problems, knee problems, general health problems, also posture (and she says that sitting all day hunched over a computer is probably bad for her posture also) – but she is unsure how disciplined she can be about posture and daily exercise. The doctor, who is rather old, said that one reason he’s in this area is that he too has faced similar issues. Mom canceled her PT appointment. Doing more assessment first may be good, but I’m not a big fan of no PT or other kinds of treatment. Going in to PT at least forces you to do the exercises a couple of times a week, and to get additional instruction, which is better than nothing. Cost may be an issue here too (plus the time to go to PT – though Mom might do it on the way to or from work). This seems look progress on some fronts, but not others. (I’m not sure how much retiring would permit Mom to attack these challenges more effectively.)

(Mom said that Florida Governor Charlie Crist – hot off of announcing a run for the U.S. Senate – today vetoed a pay cut for state workers, who have not gotten a raise in four years. Pay stability restored and MRI scheduled, Mom will lead an induction of new officers for Tallahassee’s American Association of University Women branch tonight.)

Stephanie’s father will face another court hearing after Tuesday’s. His tenants are apparently suing him for allegedly changing a handicapped ramp. He can settle for a small amount or go to trial and potentially get settled with a much larger dollar amount. Stephanie urged him to settle and then sell the property. Most of his 3-4 remaining properties seem to Stephanie to be more trouble and expense than they’re worth, especially given the state of the Central Ohio economy, which means that most tenants can’t really afford to pay rent and the pitfalls are many (thieves ransacking empty apartments, tenants suing, etc.). Part of what Stephanie’s father is probably doing is carrying on a family business and like my mother resisting retirement.

(Pictured above is the Columbus South End’s Buckeye steel plant, where Stephanie’s father once worked, which – like the West Side General Motors parts supplier factor that Mom and I also drove by this past weekend - is completely shuttered now – endemic of problems with Ohio’s manufacturing economy.)

-- Perry

More appointments

Tuesday was a big day with Stephanie’s father in Franklin County court over a landlord-tenant issue that has been brewing for some time, and Stephanie’s mother and my Aunt June back to chemotherapy treatment. Then today my Mother was off to the orthopedist for the first of appointments with doctors and physical therapists about her back problems that her regular doctors just recognized a few weeks ago. Today I went back to work for the first time in two weeks and Stephanie’s school had their second annual International festival, which Stephanie helped organize. Tonight is our final Children’s Fellowship, which may be inside (thanks to the rain). Sunday is an outdoor Pentecost worship service (weather permitting) with me serving as head usher for the third and last time this month, after our final (bilingual) Sunday school class of the school year. I am tentatively slated to go to a training for hospital visitation at church Sunday morning and at least Stephanie to a Columbus Clippers baseball game with some former high school classmates Saturday night at the new Arena district stadium (pictured above) between downtown Columbus and Goodale Park. We’ll see which of these work out. Hope confronting medical and legal issues this week is going OK for our family members.

-- Perry

Appointments

Today Vincent goes to his weekly appointment with his counselor and then we follow up with an appointment with her also, at 7 p.m. Vincent and we have backslid in the last few days, arguing about things like language, chores, and school progress. Vincent has not applied for any jobs for a couple of weeks now.

Earlier today Grandma Martha has her annual doctor’s appointment. Her back and also her knee have been bothering her lately. I have a lunch appointment with a possible Presbyterian Panel client today also.

I am slated to leave for a week in Florida at midday Tuesday. I will drop off the car for assessment and possible repair and the way to the airport. Tuesday is also Frisco’s ninth birthday, which we may celebrate a little today.

I’m trying hard to finish several projects today and Tuesday, but will have to take my laptop with me Tuesday to keep working.

Stephanie is tentatively slated to have her book club over this Thursday evening. We’ve been trying to clean the inside and work on the outside in preparation for that and Grandma Martha’s 2 ½-day visit next week. We’re all set with walkers, extra toilet seat, and food for Mom. I still have a little cleaning to do.

Stephanie has been keeping up with books but hasn’t actually been to book club for several months.

This week I’ll be visiting with friends in the Miami area, then at a fancy hotel on the beach in nearby Hollywood (the Westin Diplomat Resort and Spa - pictured above) for an expensive survey research conference (American Association for Public Opinion Research – my first time to this meeting, which my manager – the former Associate for Survey Research – used to go to). Sunday or Monday I’ll drive on Alligator Alley and past Naples and Fort Myers to the Sarasota-Bradenton area, where I’ll tool around and visit friends (my first visit there since I spent most of a day there prior to a conference in Tampa). Then I’ll fly from Tampa to Louisville Tuesday, arriving a few minutes after Mom arrives from Tallahassee. Mom and I are slated (during Days 3 and 4 of the furlough) to visit local tourist sites and perhaps Stephanie’s school) before heading for Ohio, where we plan to rendezvous with Stephanie, Vincent, Frisco, Penny, Serge, and Jacob and visit relatives over the Memorial Day holiday weekend.

-- Perry

Vincent's Derby weekend?

Vincent’s latest plan: Drop off a job application at the 4th Street Live Borders Books and Music store Thursday. Meet his friend Alex and go have dinner with Alex’s family at their home near Holiday Manor. Get up early Friday (Oaks Day – still a day off in the Jefferson County (KY) Public Schools and go over to his friend Samantha’s to help her clean her room (We’ll see if he did his weekly chores and laundry and cleaned his own room before leaving for Borders.)

The next part becomes fuzzy in my mind: At some point Friday he hopes that he and Sam can connect with his father, said to be on his way from Florida to Ohio. Later in the day – or first thing Saturday morning, after spending the night with the Davises? – he’s going to travel with them to Marietta, where some of my maternal ancestors are from and which Stephanie, Vincent, and I visited 11 years ago this month, to pick Sam’s sister up – after the end of spring semester – from Marietta College (pictured above) (where our counselor 11 years ago had gone).It’s unclear to me when they’ll be back. I guess Vincent won’t be going to the Pegasus Parade with us (weather permitting) this year. Our Derby Eve/Derby plans still aren’t clear.

P.S. Some changes in plans: It turns out that what Vincent was going to do with Alex tonight (although we still think Vincent is meeting people too close to school and then also coming home smelling like smoke from hanging out with smokers) was something we approve of. Alex, a friend of Vincent from last summer’s Denmark trip, went with another friend with whom Vincent hasn’t hung out yet to see another friend of Vincent – who he has also not seen much lately – get awarded his Eagle Scout paraphernalia at a nearby synagogue. We definitely approve of Vincent reconnecting with old friends (friends who we mainly like). Vincent had told his friend – not really joking – that he might not go because he didn’t believe in the Boy Scouts (and not so much because of their sexual orientation discrimination), even though Vincent was once a Tiger Cub.

Also, it turns out that Vincent is going with the David family to Marietta relatively early Friday morning. Because his father wasn’t due here until later Friday, he fibbed and told his father we were going to see one of Vincent’s maternal grandmothers in Ohio – because Vincent didn’t want to tell him that he was choosing going on a trip with his girlfriend instead of seeing his father. Vincent’s father stops by so rarely and Samantha goes out of town so rarely that it’s kind of too bad. I know he was looking forward to them meeting each other – but that wasn’t going to work – it turns out – no matter who he chose to hang out with because – unless their cars cross between Lexington and Cincinnati – the girlfriend and father were to be two different places Friday. We’ll see if this puts pressure on us to offer to bring Sam with us if we go to Ohio for Memorial Day weekend.

-- Perry

Congratulations!

Congratulations to Kathleen Sibelius, now a 60-year-old former two-term Kansas governor, confirmed by a mainly party-line Senate vote and sworn in as U.S. Health and Human Services department secretary Tuesday (instead of former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, whose nominations tax return and lobbying problems derailed). Sibelius’ father is former Ohio Governor John Gilligan, who I was interviewed briefly (and unpleasantly) as part of my dissertation research.

Congratulations also to Scott Murphy, a 39-year-old NYC venture capitalist who beat out a long-time Republican state legislator (Jim Tedisco) whom the upstate NY anti-abortion activists whom I interviewed as part of my dissertation research loved. Recall that the special election – whose vote count at one point had Murphy and Tedisco TIED – was made necessary when NYS’s governor tapped a rather conservative upstate NY Democratic congressperson (Kirsten Gillibrand) for Hillary Clinton’s U.S. Senate seat. I wrote in my dissertation about how the evolution of Gillibrand’s longtime predecessor from Kennedy Democrat to conservative Republican mirrored the change in upstate NY’s political landscape. On his way to be sworn in, Murphy went from Glen Falls, which I visited to do an interview during my dissertation research, to the legendary Halfmoon Diner in the Saratoga County suburb of Albany (Clifton Park), where I also interviewed someone. Murphy and his family apparently moved to Glens Falls, near the farm where his wife grew up, so he could run for Congress. No stranger to politics, Murphy had also served as an aide to two Missouri governors.

Both Sibelius and Murphy have won in areas (Kansas and upstate New York) that are heavily Republican. But Gilibrand had won reelection with 70 percent of the vote, a margin that Murphy obviously didn’t come close to (his margin was apparently a few hundred votes).

-- Perry

Cautiously good news

Cautiously good news on the health front: The surgeon examined my groin – including having me cough – and said she thinks I probably pulled on the scar tissue. She suggested I continued avoiding lifting/stretching/other activity that tugs on the groin for another month. If it still hurts, she’ll probably send me to have a computer tomography (CT) scan of my groin. She detected no hernia, but says very small hernias she can sometimes miss. In addition (I believe) to avoiding picking up heavy object, she said I might also stretch (in general) regularly (which will make it harder to irritate the scar tissue – if it’s more flexible).

I stopped at home and walked the dog (and Frisco and I got stuck on the other side of a very slow-moving train - see photo above and video below). Vincent seems mainly to be alternating between sleeping, eating, watching Cartoon Network, and going over to his girlfriend’s. He requested a ride home again today.

In other health-related news, swine flu has begun circling closer to us, showing up within the past 24 hours in South Bend, IN, and Columbus, OH.

-- Perry

Aunts' health

The health of two of my aunts has taken a turn for the worse. Very serious health problems had already plagued Aunt June (pictured above at the December 2008 family Christmas party in Marysville, Ohio), my mother’s half-sister (the youngest of Grandma Beck’s children). In the past week or so she learned that she has throat cancer (Stage 4). June apparently has genetic abnormalities that make her veins and arteries very narrow and make her body rejected transplants and any inserted items. For this reason, she is a very unlikely surgery candidate. She goes to the doctor next Monday to find out what options she has. June is a widow whose disabled son died some 10 years ago. Sister Barb currently lives with her. Daughter Diana (pictured below with husband Jay) and her family live 10 miles away, and son Dustin (pictured further below) lives 25 miles away.

Another widow, Aunt Songza, the middle of my father's three sisters, has a condo in Seoul, South Korea. She was visiting Seoul and walking down the street several weeks ago and a car hit her (much like me in NYC 15 years ago) (Seoul city street pictured below). Like Natasha Richardson last month, Songza thought she was OK. After a longer period than Richardson, Songza began to experience terrible headaches and went to the hospital, where they found she had swelling on the brain. They drilled small holes in her head and drained the hematoma. One of her daughters, Cathy, who I’ve visited in New Jersey, has flown in, and she is apparently recovering OK.

June is only 3 ½ hours away in Ohio, and so we may see her soon. I saw her twice in late 2008, once in the hospital. To my discredit, I have not seen Songza for some 10 years, but I will try e-mailing her (as at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital, there is wi-fi, I’m told, in the hospital, in Seoul). If you pray, you might pray for these two women, with apparently different prognoses, and their families. And for Stephanie’s mother, stepbrother, and grandmother, and for my grandfather, all ailing.

-- Perry

St. Ann's

Last week my step-brother, Bobby, who has been undergoing chemotherapy at the James Center in Columbus, Ohio for brain cancer, was rushed to St. Ann's hospital in Westerville (pictured above) when he came home from chemotherapy and was unable to breathe. Since he lives in Gahanna they ordinarily would have taken him to Mount Carmel East but the ambulance was diverted to St. Ann's where Perry's grandmother and grandfather both spent time.

Once he was admitted into the hospital (and rushed to ICU) and the nurses and doctors attending him received his medical history they diagnosed him with a blood clot in one of his lungs and one in his leg. They wanted to put him on a "clot buster" drug that would break up the blood clot but were afraid that any new or relatively new wounds would bleed. Relatively new wounds would include his brain from his brain surgery this past fall. If they did not put him on the drug, even with being put on oxygen, they gave him 24 hours to live.

After a long discussion with the doctors at St. Ann's and his neurologist, who actually performed the brain surgery, Bobby and Terree (his wife) decided that they would try the blood clot medicine. He would stay in ICU to be watched for adverse effects and signs of bleeding on the brain. As of yesterday when I last talked to my mother he was still in ICU but has had no sign of bleeding (other than a nick on his lip from trying to shave).

The next step is taking him off of Avastin, the only drug that seems to have done anything to his fast growing tumor. Avastin is supposedly known for blood clots as a side effect. Radiation and other chemotherapy drugs have not worked on reducing or even slowing his tumor. Now without the Avastin the next step may be hospice. This is a devastating blow since the Avastin has actually shrunk the tumor enough that he regained some movement on his left side. Avastin is also one of the drugs that Mom is taking for her chemotherapy. Now we have one more side effect to watch for with her.

Please keep Bobby and Terree in your prayers. Tough decisions need to be made about next steps, if there are any.

---Stephanie

Congrats, 'Noles (and Bucks)!

Florida State's men's basketball team upset No. 1 North Carolina this afternoon in an Atlantic Coast Championship semi-final game. Thanks to clutch shooting and defense by Toney Douglas (pictured above), Derwin Kitchen, and Coach Leonard Hamilton's other team members, FSU won 73-70 in Atlanta and headed to its first ever ACC men's championship game. Rolling simultaneously were Coach Thad Matta's Ohio State men's basketball team, which leveled No. 7 Michigan State en route to another conference championship game, the Big 10 title game in Indianapolis. Both teams are now probably assured decent seeds in the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament - aka "March Madness" - whose selections will be announced Sunday and which will start Thursday. Up next: tonight Coach Rick Pitino's No. 5 Louisville Cardinals play in the Big East conference championship game in New York City's Madison Square Garden. Go Cards!

-- Perry

End of the road

Almost two weeks after hearing about it and after several attemps at trying, Stephanie found media confirmation - a story on th e Web site of a paper in a NC small town about a serious traffic accident - of the apparent death of one of the big nemeses of our lives, Vincent's ex-stepmother, "Rosie," who helped mastermind and motivate much of Vincent's father's campaign against us for almost a decade. Rosie always believed that Vincent's father secretly still loved Stephanie - and perhaps he did - and so he had to be especially mean to Stephanie to prove this wrong. Rosie may have legitimately loved - whatever this meant for her - Vincent as a stepson and may have convinced herself that she was the superior mother. But Vincent was also a convenient toy with which to terrorize Stephanie (and therefore Vincent and me). Together, the were quite a pair - both violent, both charming, both excellent liars. Stephanie's father always said that when Stephanie and Vincent left Ohio - despite their efforts to stop this - their marriage couldnt last. Although the trial still loomed, without Stephanie there in person to battle against, why stay together? And sure enough after a few years it became apparent that Rosie had connected with another man. And then we became occasionally involved in complex triangles and squares with Vincent's father, Rosie, and Vincent's father's new sometimes girlfriend. At various times both of these women called Stephanie for aid in legal fights against Vincent's father. And - as I mentioned earlier this week - at one point Rosie got us some money by scaring Vincent's father into catching up with back child support to everyone lest he go to jail (the other woman eventually got him sent to jail). This woman still scares us. The last time I remember seeing her (although Vincent's seen her more recently) was when Vincent and his then half-brother joined one of my side of the family's family reunions in Westerville, OH, and then Vincent stayed over at Rosie's house, then less than a mile from my grandparents' house. But Rosie then moved with her new husband (involved somehow in NASCAR, Vincent's father's and her favorite sport also) to North Carolina (nearby NASCAR racetrack pictured above), and then Vincent became estranged from his brother. More legal fights eventually pushed Vincent's father to ask to prove that he wasn't actually Vincent's would-be half-brother's biological parent, and I don't think Vincent had talked with Tyler (then Tom) for a year or two until he called to talk about his mother's death. Yes - in an accident eerily similar to the one Stephanie's mother was in (except this time the driver at fault was the one injured - and worse) Rosie was apparently driving early one morning and veered off the road, then swung back across and crashed into an oncoming car - but this one was an SUV. When Vincent's father called, he intimated that she had lingered for several days - apparently with little brain function - until folks called it quits. Rosie and Stephanie has always been the same age - but she will now always be 35, two years older than I was when I met Vincent and Stephanie - and his father and Rosie and Tyler. Stephanie and I have long disliked this woman and Stephanie - despite herself - expected she might feel some euphoria if Rosie ever died (she apparently had a very serious and even life-threatening heart condition ever since we met her). But Stephanie says the whole thing has felt curiously anticlimatic - even when - as of tonight - we don't have to take Vincent's father's or Tyler's word for it, since the crash was in the media: http://www.observernewsonline.com/content/view/87613/1/ Rosie of course leaves a teenage son - probably 15 - and husband. A survivor of a difficult childhood, Rosie returned - to be buried - to a childhood home area in Vinton County, OH (where my Grandma spent one of her young years). Stephanie said Vincent's father- who toyed with going back with her at one point - and even Vincent showed little emotion about this news, but I'm afraid that's par for the course with Vincent and his father either way. I myself am not sure what I think although I know one nemesis that we won't be facing in court or in the parking lot again. Three stories to ask us about some day: Stephanie and Rosie's fight in the front yard, Stephanie cowering in the laundry room while Rosie crosses the parking lot, and Rosie on TV shifting pennies back and forth on a table in a fraudulent fund-raising scheme that eventually netted some $40,000 and cosmetic surgery for Rosie (a scheme that we helped finally stop).

-- Perry

Wedding trip

Vincent and I went on another difficult trip - when we again weren't getting along. Back to Ohio again - this time, not for a funeral on Vincent's father's side of the family or a hospital trip on my side of the family - for a wedding on Stephanie's side of the family. Getting married was Stephanie's cousin Johnny to a woman he'd known for just a few months at their new church in the Columbus suburb of Hilliard (where Vincent's father and my cousin also used to live). Vincent and I lingered at home and I made a wrong turn in Hilliard, and so we managed to miss the whole ceremony. Above - leaving the ceremony - are John's sister Heather and her family. Below are John's parents Marvin and Pat (Pat - one of the few people who have read my dissertation introduction and a fellow Weight Watcher.)

Leaving below are Stephanie's mother Nancy and Don.

Below is Stephanie's stepfather, Bob.

Below are the newlyweds, having just walked down the aisle and spoken with just about everyone in the sanctuary (like a reverse receiving line).

Below, Lydia and John approach us.

Below is the scene for the reception, in the church Fellowship Hall, which Vincent and I caught a lot of (Vincent - when he wasn't off reading elsewhere and asking me if we were leaving yet).

Below is Stephanie's cousin - and Don's daughter Julie and her new baby - Julie and her three kids and her parents now all live in the Mt. Vernon area, where many of Nancy's siblings and their spouses and some of their kids have moved (see also "Apple Valley Christmas"). Stephanie and I had a memorable encounter with Julie back when we were first dating.

Below is Carol, Don's spouse and Julie's mother, with her granddaughter and housemate.

Below are Julie's older kids.

Below is Nancy and Mary, her brother Steve's high school sweetheart and new spouse.

Below is Mary's spouse Steve.

Below is Steve and his brother Marvin, father of the groom. John and Lydia's wedding came together slowly and belatedly, which made John's parents a little nervous. Their church friends helped the couple and their parents bring it all together during the final week.

It took a while for the newlyweds and their immediate family come to the reception - apparently because they were getting pictures taken. We socialized (and Vincent also read and complained), ate, and then watched as the couple cut the wedding cake (below).

Below the smiling couple cuts the cake.

And they also ate cake - no smushing.

We socialized and took pictured a little more. Carol and Steve talked some with Grandma Mary.

Below is a posed picture of Grandma Mary and most of her extended family (including Vincent - top left).

An excuse Vincent (and me - so he wouldn't keep complaining) had for leaving was that it was starting to snow outside. Of course, the amount of snow and wind was small compared to what we'd get later this winter. As planned, Vincent and I stopped to eat at a great cheap Japanese restaurant at the Florence Mall food court (Florence, y'all - not too far from Covington, where Stephanie and I got married), before going to see the new Bond movie at a new movie theater across the parking lot from the mall: "Quantum of Solace," which turned out not to be anywhere as good as Daniel's Craig's initial Bond movie (and the prequel to "Solace"), "Casino Royale." Before we left I took a picture of the bald and Vincent with Nancy, both smiling.

-- Perry

Stewardship Minute

At the same worship service in which Stephanie was blessed in advance of her Guatemala trip and Isabel Rose was baptised, I gave the following Minute for Stewardship presentation:

I should start out by mentioning that my Mother grew up in Ohio. Our ancestors on her side of the family going way back are English and Irish.

For many years, my Mother’s parents – my Ohio grandparents – supported something called the Oriental Missionary Society. The Oriental Missionary Society was an organization dedicated to the spread of the Gospel in East Asia.

Every year Grandma and Grandpa went to a fund-raising banquet put together by the Columbus, Ohio affiliate of the Oriental Missionary Society. There they joined with others in praying for the liberation of China, North Korea, and North Vietnam from Communist rule. They also prayed for the Oriental Missionary Society mission workers in different parts of East Asia. And they prayed for the people of East Asia, that they might hear the Good News of Jesus Christ and feel a connection with that message.

They also got to hear from a couple of Oriental Missionary Society mission workers visiting from East Asia. And they got to write a check to the Oriental Missionary Society.

My grandparents were very generous. But my Grandpa was also a very cautious man. My grandparents had lived through two world wars and a Great Depression. They lived very simply and very frugally. The tell-tale signs of my Grandpa’s do-it-yourself approach to home improvement were evident throughout their house: lots of duct tape. My Grandma never met a serving of food in the refrigerator that she thought should be thrown away. Food was meant to be eaten, not thrown away. I always thought that my Grandpa took so well to recycling when I came to their town in the late ‘80s because it harkened back to the scrap metal drives of the war period.

When it came to writing that check, I’m sure that Grandpa wrote a check big enough that it hurt . . . somewhat. But only somewhat. Grandpa trusted God to provide. But he also figured God expected him to look after not only the church but also himself and his family.

God never did choose to liberate the people of China and North Korea, at least not exactly as Grandpa and Grandma had imagined. God did answer one of their prayers in a particularly creative way. You see – in the days before Skype, the Discovery Channel, mission trips, and the new immigration to the United States – my grandparents also prayed that they might meet and get to know someone from East Asia and they might see of the fruit of the labor of Christian mission workers in that part of the world. So, God sent them a Christian young man from northern Korea, whose family had been directly touched by the work of Christian mission workers there – in fact, by Presbyterian mission workers. They got to know this young man and they accepted him as their son-in-law. For a middle American family, 11 years before Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, this was more than a little daring. They also got to know some members of this young man’s extended family, including his father, who soon was enrolled in seminary in the neighboring state of Kentucky.

In the involvement of my grandparents with the Oriental Missionary Society, I see some of the hallmarks of mission involvement here at Crescent Hill church. I see local and international involvement. I see long-term commitments. I see support for international mission workers. I see attention to structural change. I see building personal relationships. I see answered prayer. I see sacrificial giving. I see personal stewardship, including stewardship of self.

Through prayer and volunteer work, many of you are already involved in the mission enterprises that Crescent Hill church supports. Those enterprises include: the possible Guatemala K’ekchi Estoreño Izabal Presbytery Partnership. They include the Environmental Justice Committee. They include the Crescent Hill Presbyterian Church Pre-School and Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville and its summertime Garden Camp. They include United Crescent Hill Ministries, Presbyterian Community Center, and Habitat for Humanity. They include Mid-Kentucky Presbytery, the whole Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Presbyterian seminaries, and the half a dozen Presbyterian international mission workers who are part of our congregation.

On November 9, by pledging for the first time to make regular financial contributions to Crescent Hill church or by matching or even increasing this past year’s pledge, you will not only help the church continue to support these and other mission enterprises but you will also help shift us towards a goal of making mission a bigger part of the annual church budget.

In all of this – as in many other things – we could do worse than following the example of my Grandpa – who – in two months – God willing – will celebrate his 95th birthday. Happy birthday, Grandpa!

-- Perry

Good-bye; and get well soon

Halloween weekend - from the day the Danes were to leave Louisville - through the Monday Stephanie was to leave for Guatemala - I had originally planned to take the four of us to attend an anime convention we had been to the year before in Covington, KY (see "Cincinnati"), outside of Cincinnati. But Vincent's grades continued to go south, and Stephanie had last-minute preparation - and it turns out we would very soon thereafter have another reason to head north - and so we stayed home. Monday afternoon - after getting Vincent to do some homework (this was a low moment in our relationship) - Vincent and I headed up Interstate 71 through the fall foliage of northern KY.

Passing the site of the anime convention (having just ended the night before), we headed down the hill into Covington, past the Main Strasse clock tower, and across the bridge into Ohio.

We had gotten a call on our answering machine in the middle of the week, letting us know that Vincent's great grandmother, Granny Love, with whom we had visited in May (after a year and half or so break) - she having moved from the home of one set of relatives to another after having some strokes - had died that week (the last Danes' week). Granny was one of the people from Vincent's father's side of the familiy that we stayed closest with. She took care of Vincent while Stephanie and Vincent's father's relationship was deteriorating (one of a series of friends and family members who took care of Vincent in Ohio before he went to institutional child care at age three) at her old house near the Ohio State fairgrounds. She essentially sided with Stephanie in our biggest court fight with Vincent's father, as she believed her granddaughters and great granddaughters who said Vincent's father had molested them. She helped me out with my dissertation research, and we stayed in touch with her as much as we could by mail and periodic Central Ohio visits. She was born - like Stephanie's grandmother - in West Virginia, moved up to the Columbus South End during the Depression - and her husband - Grandpa Love - was a pastor. Together, they were on the radio for years - long before I had met her. During the ten years I knew her - with various pets, in various homes - her health had slowly deteriorated. We had trouble tracking her down after she moved from Reynoldsburg to Orient - after she had some strokes. Staying in touch with Granny had helped us stay in touch with some other members of Vincent's father's side of the family - including witnesses and supporters at the trial - sometimes when Vincent's father was in the outs with this side of the family. This helped lead to oddities like Vincent's father and us doing a visitation transfer of Vincent at Granny's - when it wasn't clear he would have been able to see other family members for Christmas otherwise (and Vincent's father giving me a hug to thank me)- and the crowning oddity - us going to Vincent's father's parents' 50th wedding anniversary party - on the South End - which Vincent's father disappeared from half-way through - without - among other things- saying good-bye to Vincent. Granny was a sweet lady who had grown tired of her health problems in her final years, who loved her family and would stand up for them (and treated not only Vincent but also Stephanie and me as family). Thanks in part to our late departure, Vincent and I missed most of the hour before visitation - but arrived soon before the service (it was all on one day - just in two hours). When we arrived, not only was Vincent's father and some other family members not there - but there were a bunch of people I didn't recognize. We did recognize a picture of Granny and Grandpa Love - who died before I came on the scene - and so I never met him.

The memorial services included family members singing (see below) - including some we'd seen - with Granny - in North Carolina - some two or three years ago) and friends and family members leading prayer and preaching. It was an evangelical service - complete - if I remember right - with an altar call (although the first song sang was not particularly religious).

The seats were pretty packed, and so I sat off to one side - near Jennifer (one of our witnesses) and her family - and Vincent sat - perhaps predictably - off to another side - near his father's parents. Pictured below are the folks who sat in the middle - including some of the leaders of the service.

Pictured below are Jenny and one of her children.

Below is another of Jenny's children and the man she was there with (whom I unfortunately did not meet).

Note the box of Kleenex in front of the picture below, which I and others used liberally.

I tried to speak with Granny's two final hosts - Candy and Sue - and did a little - but Candy was beside herself and they had a throng of family members trying to comfort them. (But it was important to pay tribute to the person whose loss we were all grieving: Granny Love.) There was no food, and so Vincent and I ended up in - of all places - McDonald's - on 256. Arriving there, I called my Mother, and she said my aunt, Aunt June - who lives near 256 and near Stephanie's mother - was in a squad car - with head pain and high blood pressure. I hesitated for a moment - because I knew we would get home late - but I ended up dropping Vincent off at Barnes and Noble on 256 - not too far from Stephanie's mother's - and I drove off to Mt. Carmel West Hospital, where I found Aunt June in a curtained off room in the emergency room (although it took me a while to get in ).

Sitting in the room was Aunt June's sister and now housemate (recently moved back from Las Vegas, after getting divorced from Art), Aunt Barb, who has health problems of her own.

Also there was one of Aunt June's two surviving kids, Diana, a former colleague of Stephanie who introduced Stephanie and me to each other. Diana is an insurance company staff person in Columbus and lived at the time with her husband and their adoptive daughter and two foster kids in their new house way SW of Columbus. Her husbsand Jay himself has health problems. At this point we had not seen Diana's brother, Dustin, for quite a while.

June's body has been through quite a lot and doctors say she can't take any more surgery, and her body has rejected past transplants and the lot. This unfortunately was neither the first nor the last time June suffered from these blood pressure spikes (and blinding head pain) - they've continued with various theories - none have really panned out - about what might be the cause. (What has happened to June it turns out may not be that different from what happened to me a month plus later - though it only happened to me - so far - this once). June chatted with us - but - by the time I'd left after an hour or so - the medicine that relieved her pain had also put her to sleep.

Unfortunately, June has been in and out of the hospital several times since then and they still don't know what exactly is causing the blood pressure spikes and head pain (and some other health problems). The drive home didn't help Vincent and my health, stress levels, and sleep patterns. But I thought - since June was in a hospital a couple of miles away - I couldn't blow this opportunity to see her (Stephanie and I had driven up a year plus one day before - while Vincent was wrapping up the anime convention- to visit her while she had her own room at Mt. Carmel West). You might pray or think positive thoughts for peace and healing for June (as well as for Barb, for Dustin, and for Diana - who's had to deal in December with the loss of two foster kids - Eric and Rain - who had been with them for two or three years) (as well as for Candy, Sue, and Jennifer). (Click on play below to see - sideways, I'm afraid - a clip of a song at Granny's funeral.)

-- Perry