I Remember…

Last year, December 14 was Shabbat at the URJ Biennial in San Diego.

I was up early, eager to fulfill my Biennial responsibility as a Torah guardian.  In this role, I was responsible for carrying one of the many scrolls that would be used in the service from the storage room to the site of the service, keeping an eye on it throughout, and, afterward, returning it safely to the room where it would remain with the others under lock and key until it was returned to the local congregation from which it had been borrowed.

Equal Time

Earlier today, I promised my sister I wouldn't use social media to check in here.  And I didn't.

However, I did not promise her I wouldn't blog about my experience, but don't worry, I'll spare you the gory details.

Nonetheless, if I'm truly going to advocate for cancer detection and prevention, I can't do it just for this test; I have to do it for this one, too. (As a BRCA2 mutation carrier, I am at increased risk of several types of cancer besides breast and ovarian.  These include pancreatic and primary peritoneal cancer, as well as melanoma. Although some early studies suggested a possible link between BRCA mutations and increased risk of colon cancer, it has not been confirmed in subsequent studies.)

Regardless, having recently turned 51, I fall within the demographic of the general population who should be screened for colon cancer. 

And with that, I'll leave you with a few statistics and this public service announcement about screening based on information from the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy:

Colorectal cancer is the third leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States. Approximately 150,000 new cases are diagnosed every year in this country and nearly 50,000 people die from the disease. It has been estimated that increased awareness and screening would save at least 30,000 lives each year. Colorectal cancer is highly preventable and can be detected by testing even before there are symptoms. The American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy encourages everyone over 50, or those under 50 with a family history or other risk factors, to be screened for colorectal cancer.

Oh, one more thing:  The propofol-induced nap was amazing and the test results were completely normal.

Children in Our Lives

As someone without any of my own, I've always believed that children come into our lives in many ways.

I've been lucky, and indeed they have.

Here's Matthew, the first one who ever called me "Aunt Jane."  He's my college roommate's son and he came into my life on July 11, 1995.  Today he's a freshman at Lafayette College, the place where his mom and I met.

Here's Ian, the second one to call me "Aunt Jane."  He belongs to my sister, and he came into our family on August 7, 2002.  A terrific athlete with a kind heart, he loves baseball, basketball and football, card games, Sponge Bob, and hanging out with his friends.

Here's Sam, who came into my life and the lives of thousands of others on  June 14, 2012, when his mother created this blog.  Sam loved turtles, frogs and bugs, played the piano, and spent lots of time doing fun things with his three siblings and the rest of his family.

Yes, children come into our lives in many ways.

They're not supposed to go out of our lives, however.  And they're certainly not supposed to die.

But that's what happened to Sam.  Exactly 18 months to the day after his mom wrote that first post, Sam died.

Nothing can bring Sam back, and nothing can take away his parents' pain.

Nonetheless, 81 individuals--mostly rabbis and Jewish professionals from throughout the country--have committed to shave their heads in March to raise money (and awareness) for childhood cancer research through St. Baldrick's Foundation. The original #36rabbis' $180,000 goal quickly was surpassed, and the group has now raised nearly 77 percent of the updated goal of $360,000.

With March 31 quickly approaching, what better way to honor Sam's memory, support families in the midst of battling this horrid disease, and sustain hope that childhood cancer will become--speedily and in our day--a thing of the past?

Letter to Chicago

Dear Chicago,

As I noted in a recent post, "I've visited Barrow, AK, but never Chicago, IL, except to change planes at O'Hare."  I think it's time that we finally meet IRL, and I'd like to check your calendar to see if there are some dates later this winter or in the spring that might be good for a visit.
 
There are lots of things I'd like to build into my itinerary, but it certainly will come as no surprise that at the top of my list will be seeing Phyllis and her family.  Even if there's nothing to say but "Hinneni" (as thousands of us have been doing--from near and far--for the last 18 months), I can hold her hand, hug her close, share her pain. If the weather's OK, maybe she, Michael and the kids will be willing to show me some sights--the zoo, a museum, or the skaters at Millennium Park. Or, maybe we'll spend an afternoon just hanging out in the kitchen that her pictures always portray as so very warm and inviting.

I'm hopeful that the timing also will allow me to visit with Rachel Roth, Stacey Zisook Robinson, Janine Mileaf, Stephanie Fink, Barb Leibson Shimansky, and Kate Heilman--as well as include tourist stops at the Art Institute of Chicago, the John Hancock Observatory, Wrigley Field, and an authentic Chicago deep dish pizza spot, the specifics of which I'll leave to the locals. (When my parents visited Chicago in the mid-1980s for a cousin's wedding, my mom brought home a pretty bangle bracelet for me from Marshall Field's.  Too bad that's not still a tourist spot...)

So what do you say, Chicago?  Please check your calendar and let me know what might work for you.  I'll set up a fare alert for LGA to ORD, pull out a hat, warm boots, and my mittens (even though I'm at that stage of life that makes it totally unnecessary for me even to button my coat in New York City), and hope we can make this visit a reality.

I look forward to an opportunity to follow the "Ground Transportation/Exit" signs at ORD and to seeing you (and my friends who live near you) sometime in the next few months.

~ Jane.

Happy Birthday, The Mums

Dear The Mums,

It's a yucky day -- unseasonably warm and rainy -- in New York City so I hope there's good weather wherever you are and that you're enjoying your birthday.  If you see Larry Kaufman today, don't forget to wish him a happy birthday, too.  In addition to a love of Torah and the URJ, a November 17th birthday was something else the two of you shared.

There's lots to tell to bring you up to speed, so let's go.

Last night I had dinner with Karen and Phil Ott, who were visiting in New York for the weekend.  It was, as always, great to see them and, except for a few more gray hairs, they haven't changed at all!  Over dinner, Karen told me that you'd hung a bunch of different post cards over my crib, including Van Gogh's Starry Night.  She also told me that you often referred to me as Madame Nhu. Hmmm...based on what I read about her on Wikipedia, I can't quite figure that one out, but perhaps Daddy can shed some light on that particular nickname. 

Two weeks ago, I spent the day at Lafayette, where I was the November 6th speaker in the annual Madame de Lafayette series, which "seeks to recognize what it means to be a woman in the 21st century."  As I have done several times in the past, I spoke candidly about my BRCA journey, noting that had I heard a talk like my own when I was a student, the trajectory of our family's history had the potential to be different than it actually played out.  If my remarks help change the course of just one other family's history as it relates to hereditary cancer, you and I together will have added some good to the world.  (I'm not sure why the online publicity refers to me as Rev. Herman, but spending the day in Easton -- reconnecting with Bob and Sandy Weiner, meeting current students, many of whom are active in Hillel and/or members of Alpha Gam, and seeing Terry and Tom's Matthew, a Laf Coll freshman this year -- was, indeed, good for my soul!)

I'll have a chance to do more awareness raising about BRCA mutations at two upcoming events.  The first is  a Biennial learning session, where I'll be a panelist together with Rabbi Marci Zimmerman from Temple Israel in Minneapolis and Dr. Susan Domchek, Executive Director, Basser Research Center for BRCA.  In early February, I'm scheduled to speak at the Sisterhood Shabbat at Congregation Beth Or in Ambler, PA.  Terry's planning to come with me, and she and I are already planning to make a weekend of it!

As tough as the whole BRCA mutation journey has been, it is, at least, a harbinger -- something my friend Phyllis didn't have when leukemia struck her son, Sam.  He just turned eight and, despite a bone marrow transplant from SuperMensch at the end of August, the family's huge community learned this past week that the cancer has returned and, as she wrote on Sam's blog, "There is no cure.  There is no treatment."  The six of them -- Phyllis and Michael, Sammy and his sibs -- will be off to Israel shortly, where they'll be packing a lifetime of memories into the time they've got left.  We are so sad for all of them.  There are no words and, as I noted on Facebook yesterday, "Jacob isn't the only one wrestling with God this week."

I don't want to end on such a sad note so I'll tell you that Daddy and I are going to Detroit next weekend for Carolyn's bat mitzvah.  Amy and Ian, unfortunately, can't go, not only because of Amy's crazy travel schedule, but also because she recently signed a book deal (!) and her writer is going to be in New York at the same time she would be at the bat mitzvah.

One last thing:  It's certainly not a book deal, but I recently took on an interesting freelance project with the Mellon Foundation, thanks to my connection to Scott from New Hampshire, and I need to go do some work on it.  I'll write again soon.

Happy birthday, The Mums...miss you...xoxo,

~ Boo!

Mundane, Normal Stuff

Earlier today I was in the kitchen cutting up some chicken and thinking about my friend Phyllis.  I’m not sure that the two things are related in any way except that I’ve been thinking about Phyllis and her family a lot since her six-year-old, Superman Sam, was diagnosed with leukemia two weeks ago. 

This morning, though, I was remembering back to January when Phyllis was in New York for a few days, attending a program at HUC, and I was lucky enough to get her for brunch on that Sunday morning.  While I prepared the strata and the fruit salad, we caught up over coffee in the kitchen—everything from our latest reads and the price of toilet paper (she gets hers from amazon.com), to blogging, other social media, and our many mutual friends.  Just mundane, normal stuff. 

Mundane, normal stuff is exactly what I’m wishing for Phyllis right now.  A r’fuah shleimah (a speedy and complete recovery) for Sammy, and a quick return to mundane, normal stuff for his ima (mom) and the rest of his family.

Please keep Sam in your prayers (send him a photo of yourself as a member of his superhero team) and may he and his family get back to mundane, normal stuff faster than Clark Kent can find a phone booth and change into Superman!