Vicki in Her Own Words

Throughout Vicki's life she focused on making good friends, and being a good friend. Her years attending Furman University in Greenville, SC provided her some of her most cherished friendships and experiences. Shortly after Vicki's cancer diagnosis several of her college friends traveled to our home to demonstrate their support for her. I have included a picture I took at the front door to our house that weekend, and a letter she later wrote to her friends. Here is the letter Vicki wrote:

April 14, 2004

Dear Denise, DeeAnne, Julie, LB, Leanne, and Mary Beth,

I’m finally getting around to writing a letter that I’ve been “thinking” for over a month. I admit to being somewhat overwhelmed by the tremendous gift that you all gave to me by coming up for the weekend to visit. What a fun time of remembering and catching up that was! I’ve often told people that my college years were some of my favorite years of my life. Friends like you are what made those years special. Friendship is a powerful and wonderful thing. I’ve been truly blessed through my life by having good friends all along the way. I’m thankful to be able to count each of you among my friends.

Denise, thanks so much for opening up your home for the crowd to come and stay. (I only wish I could have come and hung out there too.) Thanks for coordinating, chauffeuring, feeding, navigating, etc. for the weekend to help all of the details come together. Thanks to the rest of you for clearing your schedules and leaving your families to come together to encourage an old friend who really needed it. Your sacrifice is noted and appreciated. DeeAnne, how is your Kelly doing now? I was so sorry to hear of her illness and all that y’all went through to get her diagnosed and stabilized. Will she be having surgery soon? Keep us posted so we can remember Kelly and the rest of your family during that time.

Your presence here with me over the weekend reminded my of Job’s friends in the Bible. As Job was getting pummeled with one thing after another, his friends came and sat with him. Knowing that there wasn’t much they could “do”, they just sat there to be an encouragement. (This was before they started opening there mouths and suggesting reasons that he may be going through was he was going through.) Thanks for coming and sitting, talking, and laughing. Under normal conditions, I imagine that we would have been out and about, touring, eating, etc. But unfortunately, I’m not in a “normal” condition. So thanks for adapting and making the weekend special by just being together.

This last treatment hit me hard from the very beginning. I’ve had more pain and, therefore, have been on more pain medicine this time. The medicine helps with the pain but it also makes me very sleepy as well. I feel like I’ve slept (or may as well have slept) through the past month. I began having trouble with the skin on my hands and feet—a result of the oral chemo drug I’m taking. The doctors have had me cut back on that drug some in hopes of eliminating that problem or not allowing it to get any worse. I still have hair on my head so I haven’t had to dip into my hat bag yet. (Thanks for the hats, by the way. It’s good to know that they are there if I need them in the future.) Julie, I wanted you to know that Lauren wore the hat and scarf you made to church one Sunday and also to school one day. She looked very chic in her attire and got compliments from several people. She was very pleased.

I go back to the hospital on Monday, April 19th, for my next treatment. I’m having a hard time getting psyched up for it. Each one has been worse than the one before. So I’m trying to prepare myself for that. But…how do you prepare yourself for that? I just have to go through it one step at a time. We don’t know yet what the doctor will be doing this time. He doesn’t know until he gets me on the machine what he’s going to find and what he’s going to do. They did a CT scan in the hospital after my last procedure so I haven’t had another one midway between the treatments like I normally do. Therefore, I don’t have any new news since Paul’s last e-mail following my treatment. The radiologist and liver surgeon were supposed to meet to discuss me and bring the team up-to-date. Hopefully that meeting took place.

Please continue to pray for these doctors to have wisdom in how they treat me. Also, please pray for more and more tissue to die in the right places so that it can shrink away from the vital veins and allow the surgeon the room he needs to get rid of this cancer. Please pray for our family—that we can encourage each other and prop each other up during this challenge. Paul has been an excellent care giver to me from the time I was diagnosed. This is an unusual role for him to play but one that he is doing so well. He is a huge encouragement to me. He encourages me to cry when I need to and he also reminds me that we still have reason to hope for a positive outcome. Please keep him in your prayers. He’s tired from all that he has going on but he’s trying to be strong for me and the rest of the family. (I can’t remember if I told you in an e-mail that Paul’s dad’s lymphoma cancer has come back. He was several months away from being declared cancer-free when he began to feel bad. The cancer is all through his stomach and lungs. He’s undergoing extensive chemotherapy right now. They cannot cure it but they hope to control it. Paul has been helpful to them in interpreting some of the medical mumbo-jumbo that they’ve been getting. He’s armed them with a lot of questions to ask the doctors and empowered them a little more in this devastating situation. Paul is going to St. Louis at the end of the month to spend a long weekend with his parents and brothers.)

Kelly got to spend spring break in Canada with some friends of ours who have a house up there. We visited this family there this past summer when we took a family vacation up there. Kelly was excited about learning to snowboard. (She thought she knew how to snowboard when she used a neighbor’s board during a snow here in February. She could snowboard without falling from the front of our house down to the road. So she was confident that she could snowboard now.) She was in for a rude awakening as she attempted to board down the slopes at one of the largest ski resorts on the east coast. I think she ate a bit of humble pie, which is a good thing to do every once in a while. The house was quiet without Kelly here to pick on Lauren and fuss with us about everything. Did I mention to you that Kelly is pre-adolescent? Moods going every which way. Sometimes she's still like a kid and sometimes she thinks she’s 18.

Mom and Dad helped me put together a good week of activities for Lauren. She had friends over, went shopping with Gramma (her favorite activity—thank goodness I didn’t have to go!), went to a movie, went on an outing with her Brownie troop, went to a pet expo and an Easter egg hunt. She enjoyed getting all of the attention but by the end of the week, she really missed Kelly. She declared that she was glad she wasn’t an only child, that she was glad she had a sister and that she didn’t want any sister but Kelly. How sweet! That did this mother’s heart good!!

Mom and Dad took a trip back to SC the last week of my last treatment. I was glad that they could go home to get some things done and to have a break from stuff here. Our family enjoyed having the house to ourselves and having a sense of normalcy here. However, it was good to have them back again for the next round. They lighten our load so much with all they do—big stuff and little stuff. We’re so grateful that they can be here and that they share themselves with us this way. They plan to leave again at the end of May through early June. My nephew, Randy, will graduate from high school in early June and mom has doctors appointments that same week. If I’m still on the same treatment schedule, they’ll come back up here for a couple of weeks before we (hopefully) head to the beach in SC for a week at the end of June. I sure hope all of that works out.

I’ve rambled on long enough, I guess. Just wanted you to know what all is happening here. I appreciate all of your expressions of interest in what’s going on with me. Thanks for the e-mails, cards, calls, etc. They mean more to me than you’ll ever know. They are reminders that someone is “praying me through”. You all are so special to me—each of you for various reasons. I enjoy wonderful memories of times we spent together and am glad to have our recent weekend to add to the memory bank. I pray for each of you, too, when you come to mind. God has connected us together for a reason. Please stay in touch with me and with each other. I hope to see each of you again. I love each of you very much. Take care!

Vicki

Papers Publish Vicki's Obituary

We submitted death notice and obituary information to various newspapers. The papers have now published this information in case you are interested in reading the news reports.

The Washington Post

The Morning News, Florence, SC

The Salisbury Post, Salisbury, NC

The Day Vicki and I Met

In the photo above, Vicki and I were visiting Lake Konigsee in southern Germany. We had taken a vacation in Germany in August 1999 to celebrate our 10th Wedding Anniversary.

I have numerous stories of life with Vicki over the past 19 years. I decided to share one of them tonight. Maybe some of you recall stories involving Vicki and would like to share them as well. If so please e-mail a story to me and I will post it on the blog so others can enjoy the memories.

Here’s the story of the day Vicki and I met.

I first met Vicki on Saturday afternoon February 15, 1987 at Waxie Maxie Records in Falls Church, VA. I remember the moment so vividly that it seems I can just close my eyes and I am back there again. Vicki used to love to tell this story, making sure I did not omit any of it.

I had been working on a crisis project over the weekend in downtown Washington. I left work in the afternoon and headed home to my apartment in Annandale. On the way home I decided to stop by the record store to shop around.

Shortly after I entered the store I noticed a very attractive young lady enter. She looked familiar to me, but I could not quite place her. I wondered: do I work with her? Maybe I went to college with her? Well, I wasn’t sure so I decided to just be bold and ask her. I walked up to her and asked “haven’t I seen you somewhere before?” (I have to issue a danger warning here: you could injure yourself if you fall out of your chair laughing at me. Apparently I was the only person on the planet who was unaware that the phrase “haven’t I seen you somewhere before?” is a common pick-up line.)

She looked at me incredulously for a moment without speaking (As she told it she was in shock that anyone was dumb enough to use that line on her in a record store.) Then, in a truly inspired moment, I asked her which church she attended. Now, I am sure that’s not a common pick-up line. When she answered I discovered we attended the same church, which explains where I had seen her.

Once Vicki established that I was legitimate she began to talk much more openly. We connected instantly and began building a friendship that afternoon. We talked about a wide range of subjects for well over an hour while standing in the middle of the record store. I went home that day just sky-high after meeting Vicki. I later found out she went to her apartment and told her roommate about meeting me too.

Even if I did sound a little foolish at first, I was so glad that I took a risk to introduce myself because I had just met my best friend. The next Christmas Vicki gave me a calligraphy of the words to the James Taylor song “You’ve Got A Friend.” I still have this hanging on my bedroom wall. And the song should be playing on your computer now.

Some people have a saying that beauty is only skin deep. I would phrase this differently. I think beauty runs much deeper than skin. In my view a person may be attractive or unattractive based on external appearances, but once he or she begins to speak my view of the person can change dramatically. Vicki was a beautiful lady with a wonderful, friendly smile. But beyond the external features, Vicki possessed internal beauty. She was one of the most gracious people I have ever met. She was always faithful and fully committed to me and our family. So, when I first saw her in the record store that February day I thought she was attractive. Later, when I really knew her I realized she was beautiful.