Ludwig

The concert last night was fabulous! We even went to the pre-conceret recital, which was on period instruments, a cello, a lute, and a harpsichord. They performed two pieces. The first was a Couperin piece (composed in 1716) for harpsichord only, and the second was the Geminiani Cello Sonata in A minor (1746) for the three instruments. They were quite enjoyable.

This was followed by the Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra program. The first piece was Mozart’s Overture to Le Nooze de Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro, 1786). Even if you are not much into classical music, you have undoubtedly heard this tune. Then they performed Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 25 in C major, with Paul Lewis on the piano. Although we were not familiar with this piece, it was lovely. Following the intermission, the orchestra performed Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1 in C major (1799). Listening to the first three movements, this symphony did not seem familiar to either of us. But then the fourth movement began, and we both immediately recognized this music.

How was it that we were so familiar with the fourth movement of this piece? Lest you be overly impressed, you can be sure I had to spend some time Googling to acquire the detailed knowledge I provide here! And by now you are wondering what in the world any of this has to do with the price of tea in China. Do not fear, I am getting there.

When our daughters were little, they watched a television program we had seen as children called Captain Kangaroo that ran from 1954-1981. In the late 1970s and early 1980s when Simmie and Dina were little girls, Captain Kangaroo periodically aired a 5 minute cartoon called Ludwig, about a little egg-shaped gem that went by that name. By now you can see where this is going: the theme music that played on this show was none other than the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Symphony 1 in C major! I never knew which Beethoven piece it came from, but the minute they started to play the fourth movement, Barry and I looked at each other and had to stifle a giggle because this music is so familiar.

So I attach links to two videos: the Overture to Figaro, and one example of the animated Ludwig, in which you hear parts of the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1 in C major.

Happy Listening!

Love,

Rebecca

New pictures

I'm still struggling to learn my way around the various options in Blogger. But what I was able to do is post four pictures taken this summer, one at the top and three at the bottom of the blog page.

I still hope to eventually have a group picture. Having said that, I do love these individual shots because they capture each child's spirit so well.

Love,

Rebecca

A good time for a new look

Over the months that I have been keeping this blog on Blogger, people have occasionally written me and told me that they were having trouble reading my posts because, on their computers, the color of the text was not sufficiently different from that of the background.

So I thought, “maybe it’s time for a new look on the blog.” And here it is. TaDa!

Now I need to get the four children together for an updated picture! Somehow this entire summer has gone by and we have all gotten together numerous times and taken plenty of photographs, but I never found the opportunity to get all four children to pose for one picture. This weekend, although we are planning to be in Sharon, Simmie and family will be in New York with Ronen’s family. This activity needs to be at the top of the list for next weekend! But will I remember that?

That memory thing is still a struggle! I suppose over time it will be increasingly difficult to know much is attributable to normal aging and how much is attributable to the tumor. Many friends have commiserated with me on memory loss, although I feel compelled to remind them that there is a big difference between the gradual onset of these symptoms as a normal part of aging, and the fairly steep curve I slid down 16-17 months ago when, at the nadir of my functioning. At that point, I did not even know my own name and could not name routine items (pen, book, etc.) that the doctors or nurses would hold in front of me. I have, at best, a vague memory of some of this; Barry, Simmie, and Dina have had to fill in details. But I must say that my ability to read is improving, albeit slowly. Barry has been having me read aloud to him each day, usually an article from the New York Times which I read on-line with the font enlarged. Of course I struggle so much with just getting through the words that I lose much of the content. But this, too, I hope, will improve.

Tonight, for the first time in a few years, we are headed to Lincoln Center for a concert in the summer series, “Mostly Mozart.”

http://www.mostlymozart.org/

Here is the program for this evening:

Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra

Mozart and Beethoven

Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra

Jérémie Rhorer, conductor

Paul Lewis, piano

MOZART: Overture to Le nozze di Figaro

MOZART: Piano Concerto No. 25 in C major, K.503

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 1

We are thrilled to be going to two concerts in this series! I know it will not disappoint.

Have a great day!

Love,

Rebecca

Cleaning up the garbage

The wedding yesterday was beautiful! Traditional Jewish weddings are never dull, and this wedding included a huge number of young people who made it incredibly lively. When our daughters were married we encouraged them to invite many friends so that we would capture that wonderful energy we old fogies simply cannnot provide. It was heartwarming to celebrate with so many of our long-time friends, and we are touched beyond words to have been included.

Today was too beautiful a day to spend entirely indoors. Having a couple of errands to run in the City, we went over to the Central Park Zoo. It’s a lovely little zoo that we had visited for the first and only time last summer, but try as I might I cannot find any reference to it in my past postings on Caring Bridge or here. It is a beautifully landscaped park and a perfect place to go if you happen to be around Fifth Avenue in the 60s on a nice day and have an hour or so without anything to do.

Because it is a small zoo, it seems to be quite popular with the toddler set. The zoo was full of very young children, many with what appeared to be their Nannies. There was a Nanny with a couple of young children standing not too far from us waiting to watch the dolphin show. She had little patience with her rambunctious charges, and all I could think was “is this what Sheryl Sandberg has in mind for the next generation? This is the Upper East Side of Manhattan, an astronomically expensive place to live. But even here, who are these nannies?” It sounds terrific to talk about having nannies, but let’s be honest: such jobs are always going to pay poorly, so will rarely attract the caliber of people we want spending long hours with our young children day in and day out. Of course, Sheryl Sandberg herself likely spends what to most of us would seem a small fortune on daycare for her children, and that is a wonderful thing for her, her husband, and their family. But I am not convinced it is a realistic goal for most of us mere mortals.

Enough of Sheryl Sandberg. I really do need to get off of this topic!

So I will share a funny thought that I had after learning of the terrific results from my MRI last week: I am usually a very neat person. Why did it take me so long to clean up that garbage in my brain?

Have a great day!

Love,

Rebecca

Leaning in?

In my last update, I left off talking about pina coladas, but sooner or later we have to get back to real life. It rained much of Thursday so I had a quiet day indoors, and started to cook for Sabbath (more on that in a minute). The forecast called for a beautiful day on Friday, and we woke up early and headed over to the Botanical Garden at 7 am (it is open for members very early), even discovering a part of the Garden we had never seen before. It was hard to tear ourselves away, but Barry had to get to work and I had cooking to do.

We had invited our friends Judy and Lanny and Carole and Sy to join us for lunch. With all due modesty, I do have to say that this was one of my better efforts in the kitchen. We started with fresh fruit soup. Our daughters have been serving fruit soup this summer, and I asked for their recipe, read a few others, and concocted what turned out to be a very tasty soup with blueberries and strawberries that are in season. On Wednesday there was a farmer’s market at Mount Sinai and Barry picked up some wonderful fruits and vegetables there. So I made a basil and parmesan frittata, a sour cream and dill potato salad with beautiful little fingerling potatoes Barry had bought, a fresh corn salad with chopped cucumber and tomatoes, and a green salad with mache lettuce, pears, craisins and balsamic vinegraitte.  Our guests brought a peach tart and mixed nuts for dessert, and we put out some watermelon and cantaloupe. I cannot remember the last time the food I made was eaten so well, and it was really wonderful to have them enjoy it.

We had quite an animated conversation over lunch about Sheryl Sandberg’s book, “Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead.” Although we have not read the book, we have heard her interviewed on a couple of shows and have a pretty good idea of her message. In a nutshell, she believes that many very capable women have not achieved senior levels of responsibility and leadership because they essentially hold themselves back.  You can read about her on any number of websites; here is a recent piece:

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/29/living/parents-sheryl-sandberg-at-blogher

Barry has an interesting perspective on this issue from having worked very closely with medical residents for many years. Radiation Oncology is a very competitive field, so the physicians in radiation oncology programs are young men and women who have graduated from top medical schools, often with Ph.D. degrees along with their M.D. degrees, and are enthusiastic young physicians. The most prestigious road in medicine is a faculty position at a medical school that includes both patient treatment and clinical/biomedical research, with the goal of becoming a leader in the field. Even amongst residents in the most highly regarded programs, a relatively small proportion will be successful pursuing such careers. Based on Barry’s experience with large numbers of radiation oncology residents over the past twenty-plus years, while 20-30% of the male residents aspire to become leaders in radiation oncology, and seek positions consistent with this goal, only about 5% of the females follow that path. It should be noted that for both sexes, probably only about 10% of those with such high aspirations actually achieve their lofty goals.

Sheryl Sandberg would say, perhaps, that these bright young women are putting barriers in their own paths. She would probably say that about me as well, and to be honest, she would be pretty much on the mark. But is that such a bad thing? I had a wonderfully fulfilling career for over 25 years. Could I have accomplished more? Perhaps, but it was likely more a function of the limits of my abilities rather than the limits resulting from my other obligations. As an amazingly devoted father even long before this was a widespread expectation, Barry might say the same thing about himself, and he has accomplished a great deal in his career. At the end of the day, we accept that we are somewhat different. I am not sure it has to be viewed in a negative way.

There are always things to think about. But I will close for now because we are going to a wedding this evening, the son of Sharon friends who is getting married here in New York. We are thrilled to have been included and look forward to celebrating with many Sharon friends who will be at the wedding.

Love,

Rebecca

More good news

A couple of months after I was diagnosed in April 2012, our Sharon, Massachusetts friend Mark Weiner was also diagnosed with a tumor in his brain. Barry and I did not learn of this until we started going back to Sharon last fall. I think our friends simply did not want to burden us with any more bad news.

For Mark and his wife Hedy this also hit amazingly close to home, as Mark is a neurologist. He in fact diagnosed himself! He was experiencing symptoms and by the time he went to a doctor he already knew that he had a brain tumor. The etiology, and therefore the treatment, of his cancer was quite different than mine, involving initial surgery and radiation therapy followed by chemotherapy treatments every two weeks for a year. He has just finished his chemotherapy, and shared the following message he sent to his four grown children, which he has graciously permitted me to share with my readers.

I know all of you will join me in wishing Mark and Hedy, who recently celebrated the birth of their second grandchild, many healthy years ahead!

Today's MRI remains stable, thank God. Treatment completed. Told to go home, fatten up, get strong and get over the lethargy.

There are no words which can express our (mom & me) gratitude to Dr. Wen and his team, Debra the RN and coordinator of the clinical trial and only other Debra, not Debbie, I ever met; Lisa the nurse practitioner responsible for overseeing my care and Priscilla who was responsible for all the scheduling and med orders - maybe the most complex part of the treatment. No words, but there is always baseball. So I wrote a thank you note to the team that mom read aloud at the end of the visit: 

It's a marathon not a sprint

I believe in those who say baseball mimics life. Or is it life mimics baseball. There is no set clock. The pace is set by the players. Every pitch is a measured calculation. Should the pitcher throw the ball fast or slow, high or low? Each decision has consequences involving every member of the team. If it's a fast and high pitch, the shortstop may move to the right a step. A slow and low pitch may move the second baseman a step to the left. Pay attention. The entire team works together. Be prepared. But then, out of the blue, despite all of the preparation, the unexpected suddenly happens. The ball is hit where no one expected it to go. If the fielder is well prepared and can react quickly enough, maybe he can catch up to the ball and make the play. Maybe. Maybe not.

And so it is with life. Get educated, train hard, eat right, exercise, don't smoke, etc, etc. Do all the right things. Live a long and healthy life. Make a living working hard. Raise children, watch grandchildren grow. Good preparation, good results. Maybe. Maybe not. Maybe one day your employer announces the company is bankrupt, the real estate market crashes, or worse. Your health crashes. No problem; react quickly and correctly. Recover. Maybe. Maybe not. No matter how prepared, the outfielder may just not be able to catch up to the ball. The patient may simply not have any viable treatments available. Game over.

Early in May the Red Sox were swept in a 3 game series by the Texas Rangers. Immediately the great pundits of baseball (otherwise known as the get a lifers) were on the phone to Sports radio talk shows that the season is doomed. Don't worry, comforted the talk show host, the season "is a marathon, not a sprint." And so it is, a grueling 162 games over 6 months. Some series won, some lost. Hopefully more won than lost.

And so it is with my chemotherapy. One full year of monthly cycles. Some tolerated ok , allowing progress in rehab. Some tolerated poorly resulting in setbacks - .weakness, lethargy, fatigue. Get up and start the rehab all over again. In the end I was lucky to have moved forward more often than suffer setbacks. So far.

I, no, we  just finished a "season" of treatment, hopefully victorious. But "to everything there is a season"  (who sang that first, King Solomon in Ecclesiastes or The Byrds?). If King Solomon were alive today, he would instead have called out the great sports rally cry. "What did you do for me lately"?  Zach already called me as I enter the last chemo cycle. 20 miles on the bike? Not enough anymore. New year. New season. Kick it up to 30 miles. Zach is right. Whatever happened last year, especially the setbacks, now of course had to have an impact on our decisions heading into the upcoming year. Who knew back then if there would be a next year. But here we are lucky enough to have the blessing to start pondering  our upcoming changes, plans, decisions. What did you do lately? Time to kick it up.

Love,

Rebecca

Very good news

We went first thing this morning for the MRI and visit with Dr. DeAngelis. I think she was quite pleasantly surprised: her first words to us were “a perfect scan!” The “debris” that had shown up on all those previous scans has essentially disappeared. To say this is good news is an understatement. We talked about my progress with the neuropsych therapy, and she had some helpful suggestions. She also talked with me about not losing any more weight. All jokes aside, she told me that, frustrating as this is for people dieting to reduce body fat, after a certain age what ends up being lost is a lot of muscle, which is certainly not a good thing. I am still a bit suspicious that Barry put her up to this lecture! Barry now believes that he has received a medical order to make me gain weight.

We left Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center on this incredibly beautiful morning and knew we had to do something to celebrate. First, we had to stop at the optician for a slight adjustment to my new glasses. Then, Barry had an idea of where we should go.

I have to diverge a bit for some history. For many years, Barry and I had been almost regulars during the summer at a place called The Boat Basin Café. It is just off the West Side Highway along the Hudson River at West 79^th Street. We would always try to go early to be seated near the railing, overlooking the River. But for the past few years, even before last summer, we had to abandon this place because it was just too difficult for me to walk back up the stairs, or for Barry to push me in the wheelchair, to the street level. We never stopped missing it.

www.boatbasincafe.com

Once we had tried an alternative called Pier i that is in a similar location about 10 blocks down at West 68^th Street. It is a nice place but does not have the sentimental value for us that Boat Basin does. The lay of the land is such that the walk down to Pier i is not nearly so steep as the walk to Boat Basin, so we decided to go there. But it was such a glorious day that we decided to first take a walk along the River before going to have drinks. We started walking uptown, and quickly began to realize that we were approaching the Boat Basin Café. And we noticed for the first time that we could enter Boat Basin from the south rather than the north path that we had always used, and this turned out to be a much simpler walk.

So we had our favorite frozen drinks: Barry had a Strawberry Daiquiri and I had a Pina Colada. It was absolutely thrilling to be back there after our long absence. It was truly the best place we could have possibly chosen to celebrate the wonderful news.

Thank you all for your ongoing support. The journey continues.

Love,

Rebecca