A belated gift

We had a wonderful weekend in Sharon. Dina prepared a fabulous Shabbat lunch which was shared with another family, a couple and their four children. In particular, she served a potato salad made with multi-colored mini potatoes in a Dijon mustard dressing, and a spinach salad with sweet potatoes. The latter was actually the base for some sliced brisket, but she left some without the meat for me. I’m hoping she will be willing to share those recipes! Their friends brought along a delicious rice salad, another recipe I am hoping to obtain. Later in the afternoon we played a couple of games of Rummikub with Joshua. Either he is very good or very lucky (luck does play something of a role in Rummikub) but Joshua wins almost all of the games we play with him.

On Sunday we finally had our day out with Eliana. We first went to have lunch at Taam China (“taste of China”), a kosher restaurant in Brookline. We had such a lively conversation that I forgot to take pictures until the end, but Barry did manage to get this one while we ate our fortune cookies.

Our plan for our trip up to Brookline on Sunday was to buy Eliana a belated Bat Mitzvah gift, a Chanukiah, also known as a Menorah, the special candelabra used to hold the candles lit each night during Chanukah. She had one from when she was a little girl and was ready for something a bit more grown up, and had asked for that as a gift. We headed to a shop in Brookline just a few steps from Taam China called Kollbo Fine Judaica Gallery (www.kolbo.com). We had not been there in many years, and I had almost forgotten how much fun it is. It truly is one of the most impressive collections of creative Judaica I have seen anywhere. It is not the place to buy the more traditional sterling silver pieces, but rather the place to go when you are looking for something different and colorful. There were so many choices but Eliana very quickly connected to this one, and it was such a joy to be able to have her there with us and see her taste for this gift we hope she will use for many years to come.

Beautiful colorful menorah for Eliana

Maya has told us that she would like to replace the little Winnie the Pooh mezuzah on her bedroom door, so we are already planning our next trip up to Kolbo. Now we just need to come up with the other five Chanukah gift ideas!

Have a wonderful week.

Love,

Rebecca

The Meyerowitz Stories

We had heard an interview with Noah Baumbach, the writer and director of the new film, “The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected),” and had suggested the film to Ava and Jason when we were making our plans for Sunday. But they told us they had already seen the film on Netflix. To be honest, it had never even occurred to me that it might be released on Netflix at the same time that it was released in the theaters, but I guess this is now being done. We do have Netflix in New York so the other night we settled in at home to watch the film.

The film is essentially a series of vignettes, each starting with a title. The first is “Danny Meyerowitz was trying to park,” which introduces the character played by Adam Sandler, who has no hesitation to loudly express his frustration at trying to find and fit into a parking space in Manhattan. Fortunately, his lack of anger management skills does not impinge on his patient and loving relationship with his daughter, Eliza (Grace Van Patten), who is about to leave for her freshman year at Bard College.

The same cannot be said about Danny’s relationship with his father, Harold Meyerowitz (Dustin Hoffman). Frankly, the senior Meyerowitz is extremely egocentric and overall a fairly intolerable fellow. He is an artist who never found great commercial success, which has left him bitter and angry at everyone, including his (second) wife Maureen (Emma Thompson), his daughter Jean (Elizabeth Marvel), and even his “favored” son Matthew (Ben Stiller). Matthew is a successful business manager who lives and works in Los Angeles and does not visit often. It is only when Harold becomes ill and appears to be nearing death that the siblings are forced to reunite, and there is quite a bit of pain before they finally reach some ability to care for each other.

Like all of Noah Baumbach’s films, including “The Squid and the Whale,” “Margot at the Wedding,” and “Frances Ha” to mention a few, there is a lot to think about here.

Part of getting back to normal life is taking care of mundane tasks. The dentist we had been seeing for the past few years decided to retire, so we had to find a new one. One downside of the previous dentist was that he was located in Manhattan in the East 60s, rather inconvenient from Riverdale for a dentist. A friend recommended someone local and we both went in this week. This morning I went for my routine (every 4 months or so) visit with my pulmonologist; fortunately, everything is stable. Tomorrow we are having the outdoor lawn sprinkler system (something the previous owner had installed which I must admit is a very nice feature) drained for the winter, and next week the folks who service the heating will be coming (maybe it will be cold enough to need it?). All mundane things, but I am happy not to have too much excitement right now.

Hope everyone is well.

Love,

Rebecca

Dancing at two weddings

My father (may he rest in peace) grew up speaking Yiddish at home. In fact, he started kindergarten at public school not speaking a word of English; fortunately, children tend to learn languages very quickly. My mother heard some Yiddish growing up but was far from fluent. So, when my parents tried to keep something from my brother and sisters and me, my father would be forced to pepper his Yiddish with so much Pig Latin that we could easily figure out what he was trying to say without ever learning much Yiddish. Still, many expressions, or at least their English translations, are quite familiar.

One that came to mind yesterday was

מיט איין תּחת קען מען ניט טאַנצן אויף צוויי חתונות.

Mit eyn tokhes ken men nit tantsn af tsvey khasenes.

You can't dance at two weddings with one behind

This expression came to mind when I saw an article in this past Sunday’s New York Times “Weddings” section about the September 10^th wedding of Avital Zipper and Andrew Scheer. The bride, Tali, is the sister of our dear friend Michal, Co-Founder and President of BabyK’tan. Their father, Stuart unfortunately died of cancer a few years ago; their mother, Orah, remains a treasured friend. Tali is the Vice President of Marketing for Baby K’tan and Andrew received his smicha (rabbinic ordination) from Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, the institution founded by our own Rabbi Avi Weiss.

We were invited to Tali and Andrew’s wedding, which was in New York, but in addition to the fact that I was still in the midst of treatment for bladder cancer, our “behinds” were already engaged in another simcha (Jewish celebratory event) that day: the celebration of our granddaughter Eliana becoming a Bat Mitzvah. Still, seeing Tali and Andrew on the pages of the Sunday New York Times was quite a thrill.

A Rabbi Finds Love on Tinder


We had a very nice weekend in New York. Shabbat was low key, just the two of us. On Sunday we met up with our young friends Ava and Jason. Ava is a resident in radiation oncology at Mount Sinai who has also been through a cancer diagnosis and treatment (I wrote about her on 27 August 2016); Jason is her fiancé. With my treatment over these past months we had not had a chance to get together for a while. We met at the 79^th Street Boat Basin Café, taking advantage of an unusually warm October day. I am not sure if it is the residual effect of our respective treatments but based on Ava’s and my experience yesterday, if you do go over there you should take note that the Pina Coladas they serve are quite strong! I am not sure I said anything coherent. Still, it was wonderful seeing them.

Have a great week!

Love,

Rebecca

Colors

An e-mail from Morgan Stanley with a piece about electric cars caught my eye.

Spurred in part by existing and proposed emissions legislation that could sharply increase the cost of manufacturing internal combustion engines, as many as one billion battery electric vehicles (BEVs) could be on the road throughout the world by 2050. Under that scenario, by mid-century BEVs would comprise as much as 90% of all vehicle sales. 

I like the fact that they have given these cars a neat and easy-to-pronounce three letter acronym - BEV. One of our dearest long-time friends is “Bev,” about whom I wrote over a year ago. The use of this name makes the cars sound almost human, which, given their various capabilities, many of them are. When I read on I caught the following phrases:

…BEVs are a game changer 

…plans to introduce their own BEV lines

…BEVs could drive

…a major barrier to increasing BEV penetration

That last one might seem a bit off-color….

Speaking of color, it is a glorious day in New York so we took a short break to head over to the New York Botanical Gardens to see the annual exhibit of pumpkins. Although there were many with carved faces, the real highlight this year was the incredible variety of pumpkins, including two that claim to be the world’s largest and second largest pumpkins. I asked Barry to pose with the largest one so you could have a sense of just how enormous it is.

The world’s largest pumpkin (2309 pounds)

 

Barry with the world’s largest pumpkin

Pumpkin heads

 The world's second largest pumpkin (2269 pounds)

Multi-colored pumpkins

Blue pumpkin

Have a great weekend!

Love,

Rebecca

Proof positive

It has been two weeks now since the completion of those 37 radiation therapy treatments. When I wrote a week or so ago about the mold that was used to position me for each session, I mentioned that I had wanted to take a picture of the therapy room but that the staff preferred I not do that. This morning it dawned on me that I could almost assuredly find pictures on line, and lo and behold there are more than an ample number to be found if you just enter “radiation therapy equipment pictures” into your browser. Here is one that looks quite a bit like the machine that was used for my treatment.

What reminded me about this is a thought I had yesterday: if there was ever any doubt in my mind about whether that machine was truly doing anything other than moving around, the side effects I am now experiencing offer proof that it was doing quite a lot. What else could possibly explain the ongoing frequency and pain with urination, not to mention the skin discoloration in the treated area?

Here are some relevant points I learned from reading about urinary and bladder problems following radiation therapy to the pelvis on the National Cancer Institute web site (emphasis mine):

·        Radiation therapy to the pelvis (including reproductive organs, the bladder, colon and rectum) can irritate the bladder and urinary tract. These problems often start several weeks after radiation therapy begins and go away several weeks after treatment has been completed.

Irritation of the bladder lining (radiation cystitis):

·        pain or a burning feeling when you urinate

·        blood in your urine

·        trouble starting to urinate

·        trouble emptying your bladder completely

·        feeling that you need to urinate urgently or frequently

So, it looks like the fun will continue for a while. But I am hopeful that the benefit far outweighs the downside.

Meanwhile, in an effort to continue to return to some sense of normal life, we saw the movie “Marshall,” a film (not documentary) about the early career of Thurgood Marshall. While best known for his successful arguing of cases like “Brown v. Board of Education” in 1954, and his later career as a Supreme Court Justice, this film is about a 1941 case involving Eleanor Strubing (played by Kate Hudson), a wealthy white woman from Greenwich, Connecticut, who accused her black chauffeur, Joseph Spell (played by Sterling K. Brown) of raping her and trying to kill her by pushing her off a bridge. The NAACP sent attorney Thurgood Marshall (played by Chadwick Boseman) to defend Mr. Spell, but the local court would not allow an out-of-state lawyer (more likely, would not allow a black lawyer) to serve in this role, so local attorney Sam Friedman (played by Josh Gad) was assigned and reluctantly took on the case.

It was a complicated case, particularly because Mr. Spell thought he was helping himself by claiming that he had not been anywhere near Ms. Strubing on the night of the incident. [Spoiler Alert: I am not divulging anything here that is not a matter of public record, but if you plan to see the film and want to preserve the suspense you should stop reading this now.] In fact, what we eventually learn is that the liaison between Mrs. Strubing and Mr. Spell was completely consensual: she claimed he had raped her for fear that she may have become pregnant from this lapse in judgment, and he lied because he assumed, almost assuredly correctly, that no one would believe what actually happened. In the end, the jury did believe the truth. The movie was sometimes painful to watch, a reminder of a bleak time in our history which, despite the election of our 44^th president, we may not have completely overcome.

For the first time in a long time, I actually made it through the movie without having to use the restroom part way through! It was, however, a mad dash as the closing credits began.

Love,

Rebecca

A wonderful few days

We had a wonderful last few days of the fall holidays, spending much of the time with our grandchildren. The weather on Wednesday evening and Thursday was perfect, so we were able to spend one last day in the Sukkah, joining Dina and family on Wednesday for dinner (yummy barley/split pea soup) and Simmie and family Thursday for lunch (stuffed shells and Wynelle’s Pot Pie, an old family favorite from Sundays at the Moosewood Restaurant). On Friday the whole family gathered for a pizza (with a wide variety of toppings) birthday lunch for Noah, who is now one year old.

We had a quiet Shabbat lunch with Simmie and family and then went over and spent some nice time with Julia and Noah while the older children were off with friends. It is really wonderful to have time alone with the little ones since our attention is so often focused on the older children when they are around. It was especially heartwarming to see Noah with Barry, whom he clearly found extremely entertaining. I think Barry could have gone over one of his radiation oncology lectures and Noah would have enjoyed that, too!

On Sunday we were supposed to go up to Brookline with Eliana for lunch and shopping for the Bat Mitzvah gift we still owe her but I think she was just exhausted from all the holidays and did not feel up to going, so this excursion will wait for a subsequent trip. Realizing that everyone was busy trying to get back into the swing of regular life, we decided to head back to New York.

This will be the first full week I have had at home since way back before all the fun started over two months ago. The only items on my calendar are (a) enrolling for 2018 benefits, and (b) my Sandostatin injection on Wednesday. I spent most of the morning organizing my closet and drawers to prepare for the colder weather which undoubtedly will come. Sometimes those mundane activities are quite welcome.

Have a good week.

Love,

Rebecca

TMI?

While I was undergoing radiation therapy I had wanted to take a picture of the room where I spent those 37 visits. But the technicians discourage picture taking because there are various items in the room that may have patient information on them, and the preservation of privacy is extremely important. However, after my final treatment last week they asked me if I wanted to take home the mold that was made of my torso and used to position me during each radiation treatment. I thought this might be an interesting addition to our home décor. After all those pictures of t-shirts, here is something you probably never expected to see on my blog.

Love,

Rebecca

Slowly getting back to normal

My functioning may not be quite back to normal but I am happy to say that my blog readership seems to be.

Starting in mid-September, around the time I celebrated that 50,000 pageview mark, I had been puzzled that my numbers seemed to have dropped off substantially. I wondered if everyone was just getting tired of my silly songs and t-shirts. At the same time, on many days the e-mail I sent announcing the newest post resulted in error messages (over 1,100 of them in all) that said either

Delivery Status Notification (Delay)

Delivery incomplete

There was a temporary problem delivering your message to xxxxx.yyy. Gmail will retry for 47 more hours. You'll be notified if the delivery fails permanently.

or

Delivery Status Notification (Failure)

Message not delivered

There was a problem delivering your message to xxxxx.yyy. See the technical details below, or try resending in a few minutes.

For the life of me I could not figure out why. I shut down my computer and rebooted, I cleared my “cookies” (turns out to be a headache because I had to re-log in to almost everything afterwards), but nothing seemed to work.

Since posting yesterday, I have received over 100 pageviews, which is about average for my postings. I can only conclude that whatever was going on (bad karma?) it seems to have resolved itself.

So, if you think you may have missed anything, it is all still here for the reading! And if you do not have anything more important to do than read my old blog posts, I have to advise you that it is time to get a life!

Speaking of which, I have spent the past couple of hours packing for our trip to Sharon. Hopefully I will be able to make it from one highway rest stop (or easily accessible facilities) to the next. The last time we drove to Sharon, for Eliana’s celebration on September 10^th, was before the “cone down” when the more frequent need for rest stops began. Seems it is taking a while to resolve.

Meanwhile, after a couple of days of rain we are finally having another nice day here in New York, and our friends Judy and Lanny are going to join us for dinner. What nicer way to finish out the holiday?

Love,

Rebecca

Prayer of Thanksgiving

The weather in New York for the first days of the holiday of Sukkot was virtually perfect: sunny, warm, and dry. We were able to eat all of our meals, finish reading Katy Tur’s book, and play our usual Rummikub games in our Sukkah. Having taken our larger Sukkah to Sharon some years ago, we bought a small one for here in New York, but it was large enough to allow us to have friends over with whom we coordinated and shared three most enjoyable daytime meals. We had some great food and have enough left over to get through the week. But all good things must come to an end, and this morning it started raining in time for Simmie and family to stop over for lunch on their way back to Sharon after spending the holiday with Ronen’s family on Long Island.  

On Shabbat I felt strong enough to go to synagogue for a little while. I wanted to be able to say the traditional prayer of thanksgiving, Birchat HaGomel, which is said in the presence of the community following survival from a serious illness or dangerous situation.

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, הַגּוֹמֵל לְחַיָּבִים טוֹבוֹת, שֶׁגְּמָלַנִי כָּל טוֹב

Blessed are You, HaShem, King of the universe, Who bestows good things upon the needy, Who has bestowed every kindness upon me

Those who hear the blessing say

אָמֵן. מִי שֶׁגְּמָלְךָ כָּל טוֹב, הוּא יִגְמָלְךָ כָּל טוֹב סֶלָה

Amen. May He who has bestowed goodness upon you
continue to bestow every kindness upon you forever

To say that this was a rather emotional experience would be an understatement. Somehow, I never got around to doing this five years ago, so I was quite determined to make it happen, and especially appreciate Rabba Anat who stood with me as I recited this prayer.

I was sad to hear of the untimely death of Tom Petty last week. We definitely saw him perform once or twice in New York (sometime between 1991 and 2010) although I am hard pressed to remember just when or where (probably Madison Square Garden).

We managed to squeeze in a movie before the holiday, “Battle of the Sexes,” which tells the story of the relationship between tennis greats Billie Jean King (played by Emma Stone) and Bobby Riggs (played by Steve Carell), ending with their legendary match played in 1973. I remember this event but and the outcome but I do not believe we watched it at the time. I am not completely certain of the accuracy of all the details, but the movie was quite enjoyable.

The next few days will be a bit of down time. I am hoping to feel up to going to Sharon for the final days of the fall holidays, which will include little Noah’s first birthday!

Love,

Rebecca

Day 37 (100%)

I was never able to find a song with the number 37. But even if I had, I think I would have opted for this 1974 Dan Fogelberg classic for this final day. Dan died of prostate cancer a few months after his 56^th birthday in 2007, and the songs says so much of what I am feeling today.

Part of the Plan (Dan Fogelberg)

I have these moments all steady and strong
I'm feeling so holy and humble
The next thing I know I'm all worried and weak
And I feel myself starting to crumble

The meanings get lost and the teachings get tossed
And you don't know what you're going to do next
You wait for the sun but it never quite comes
Some kind of message comes through to you
Some kind of message comes through

And it says to you

Love when you can, cry when you have to
Be who you must, that's a part of the plan
Await your arrival with simple survival
One day we'll all understand

I had a woman who gave me her soul
But I wasn't ready to take it
Her heart was so fragile and heavy to hold
And I was afraid I might break it

Your conscience awakes and you see your mistakes
And you wish someone would buy your confessions
The days miss their mark and the night gets so dark
And some kind of message comes through to you
Some kind of message shoots through

And it says to you

Love when you can, cry when you have to
Be who you must, that's a part of the plan
Await your arrival with simple survival
And one day we'll all understand

There is no Eden or heavenly gates
That you're gonna make it to one day
But all of the answers you seek can be found
In the dreams that you dream on the way

On this final day, I am wearing the other t-shirt given to me by our sister-in-law Jody, with a most appropriate message for this moment.

So, finally, time to try to move on. I am hopeful that some of the side effects of the treatment will start to abate and I will be able to sleep better and regain some energy. No one can say just how long that might take, but the fact that I have three months before my first follow-up visit suggests it may be a while. I will try to be patient, and I know I will appreciate not having to get up and out of the house early every morning.

For those who are observing Sukkot, enjoy the holiday!

Love,

Rebecca

Day 36 (97.3%)

The only song I could find with the number 36 is literally a song called “# 36” written and recorded by the Dave Matthews Band. Here is something I found about the song:

"#36" is a song dedicated to the memory of South
African anti-apartheid leader Chris Hani who was killed in his efforts to
free South Africa.

#36 (Dave Matthews Band)

Our daughter Simmie is a huge Dave Matthews fan, and one of the many t-shirts she lent me to wear during treatment is the one I saved for today. So Sim, this one’s for you!

We went over to MSKCC this morning for my regular “Tuesday” routine, blood work followed by the gemcitabine infusion followed by the daily radiation therapy. But my hemoglobin, which has been inching downward over the past couple of weeks, was low enough that Dr. Iyer decided we could forego this last dose of gemcitabine, something he had anticipated and we had discussed last Friday. Fortunately, they were able to take me for the radiation therapy somewhat earlier than originally scheduled, so all in all the day went well.

After the radiation treatment, I met with Dr. Kollmeier and scheduled my first follow-up visit in early January. It is hard to think that far ahead!

Love,

Rebecca

Day 35 (94.6%)

We awoke this morning to the horrific news of a mass shooting carried out by a 64-year-old man in Las Vegas. The initial estimates of 20 dead have swelled to over 50, with at least 100 others wounded. The motivation for this heinous act is still unknown, but what does it matter? What possible excuse could there be? There are simply no words.

The only song I could find with the number 35 was a 2015 country-western song written and sung by Toby Keith, “35 MPH Town,” which tells the story of a once safe and happy small town that seems to have gone astray:

The “yes mam’s gone and the “please’s too,

It’s out the door with the “thank you” in the evening

You don’t see a front yard football game

The neighbor kids have done away with the shirt and skins

No one hits the front porch lights

To get the kids to come inside

'Cause the streets ain’t safe for a bike to ride down

Since they planted a prowler

In this thirty five mile an hour town

No they’re going nowhere fast tonight no matter

How fast they drive this thirty five mile an hour town

35 MPH Town (Toby Keith)

Today I am wearing one of two shirts sent to me recently by our sister-in-law Jody, who is married to Barry’s brother Rich. Jody is one of the most creative gift givers I know. I plan to wear the second shirt on the final day of treatment, so stay tuned for that one.

Love,

Rebecca