Riding for Roses

What are these cancer profiles? I’m just figuring that out. I couldn’t possibly capture a person in the short space of a blog entry. Nor could I even capture their experience with cancer. These are more of a snapshot, a small memory of that person, usually involving their cancer.

My maternal grandfather, Ralstone R. Irvine, died from colon cancer. He was a partner of law firm Donovan, Newton, Leisure, and Irvine, which sadly no longer exists. He argued before the Supreme Court. His wife was Mamie Irvine and together they raised three daughters; the middle one is my mother. They had a house, later an apartment, in Scarsdale, NY, and a house and cottage on Martha’s Vineyard. To some, he was a stern and powerful lawyer. To me, he was “Papa”, still stern, but also my loving grandfather. I have many fond memories of reading by the fire, singing, playing on the beach, “home made” fish stew (the “secret ingredient” I later learned was canned Clam Chowder, but the fish was fresh caught by Papa), swimming and sailing “out to the west of Lambert’s Cove” (that’s a James Taylor reference, kids).

When Papa was diagnosed with colon cancer, I was a recent college graduate working near Boston designing heart monitors. Like many Bostonians, I came down to Martha’s Vineyard for summer weekends. The moment locked forever in my mind is the last time I saw my grandfather. He had been diagnosed with colon cancer. He was on serious pain medication and he and his doctors had decided that the cancer was too far along for anything other that palliative treatment. Mostly, none of us talked about it much. My visits that summer were a bit more subdued than usual, but still involved reading, walking on the beach, eating lobster, and, of course, fish stew. At the end of my last visit that summer, I walked around the property saying goodbye to everyone. Every summer, Papa grew a large garden, often featuring “Burpee’s Burpless Cucumbers” and other tasty treats. He was in an ongoing battle against rabbits and other critters over who got to eat the food. That summer, the escalation included a fenced in garden and this is where we said our final goodbyes. He said “Goodbye” and I said “I hope I see you again”. His answer was short, to the point, and completely correct: “I doubt it. Take care of your mother and live well.”