Taking the dogs to the groomers to get a spring cut radically transforms their looks and to a limited extent their personalities as they become more cuddly (because they're cold). We love seeing them both ways.
Before
After
Spring arrived with a "Meh" as two more chemo treatments remained and Bethany was in a persistent state of tiredness and lethargy. Besides napping, at night we did lots of Inspector Lewis TV binging (aside: Oxford, England is a crazy dangerous place with 2-3 murders occurring every few weeks as opposed to the 1-2 a year in reality).
Springtime afternoon naps
At the end of March, Cate turned 19 at school with her family unable to make much of a fuss over her and making it worst she has evening lab class on Thursdays, so celebrating will have to wait. Adulting is overrated.
Cate enjoying the Saint Motel concert at WSU
(College isn't all work)
Haley and Cate at a party
End of Chemo
After Chemo Treatment #12 at MOBap, Bethany rang the bell with gusto so all could hear, just like she instructed the girls to always do when they were altar servers.
End of Chemo bell kiss
Bethany's Facebook post from the date:
So this is me today on my last day of chemo...
I am full of gratitude for so many people in this adventure these past 3 months:
-The amazing Cancer Infusion center nurses & my BJC cancer team at MO Bap
- The sibling who brought me weed gummies & a pizza gift card when I was having trouble sleeping (you know who you are 😉)
- Friends who "accidentally" made an extra loaf of banana bread or 2nd batch of soup, etc. & dropped at my door... even though I didn't need a food train, this kindness truly warmed me, body & soul
- All the survivors out there (some I didn't even know who were survivors) who reached out with so much encouragement and great information
- All those who kept track of my treatment dates & sent a message to check in each week to see how I was doing
- Friends who "tested" so we could spend time together
- So many kind offers for rides
- My weekly "Potassium Cheerleaders" 🎉
- All those who let me know they were praying for me (and those who didn't let me know too!)
- So many who sent cards and beautiful notes and letters or some fun surprises in the mail
- The neighbors who left their lighted Christmas wreath up across the street in support of me this whole time (came down today, no light strands remaining... so symbolic)
- The neighbor whose church ladies knit me a prayer shawl that wrapped me in love & warmth and worked its magic for me at treatment each week
- The Townie Sages for hang-out time together that just felt "normal"
- My daughters for their love & support from afar and for respecting my "zone of positivity" (😁)
- And my husband Randy, who's been coming to doctors appts. & came to every chemo treatment with a smile, fetching me ice water (and even heated my blankets at home after the first treatment 😉)... and well, for EVERYTHING ❤️ (too many things to list here, but I appreciated them all...)
To my Village: with lowered immunity, this experience can feel isolating, but I never felt alone. I can't thank you enough. 🩷
[I'll get the next few weeks "off," building my immunity back up before starting a month of daily radiation treatments... slowly but surely, I'll get back out there.]
Last chemo treament day
(unfortunately the hair would keep falling out for another month or more
and it was nearly two months before it began growing back)
April
April began with the red buds in peak bloom at the end of the first week and the dogwoods a week later, right on schedule. Tree pollen covering everything also followed right along on scheduled.
DQ Blizzards for lunch
Pollen, pollen everywhere, with all to much too breath
(Plant reproduction can be messy)
Jane organized a group of her Alpha Xi Delta sorority sisters to go whitewater rafting on the Deerfield River. `
Rented wet suits for the trip made sense
(It was pretty cold still in MA in April)
Deerfield River Whitewater!
Being proud Midwesterners, in the middle of April we enjoyed sitting on the covered balcony as a thunderstorm rolled in, muttering "We needed this". That is until the tornado sirens went off and our news and weather apps indicated the tornado was coming up I-44 / Route 66. We grabbed the dogs and spent a half hour in the basement until it passed soon to be forgotten as another non-event, which could have been life changing.
Gus-n-Pepper sheltering in the basement from the tornado
The Ides of April brought the Pride Prom at WSU, which Cate enjoyed with her roomate Haley and friend Aslyn.
Ashlyn and Cate's homage to dialing with Dali
Performing the traditional chicken and fish slapping dance with Hailey
Jane is famous?
In Boston last winter on 26 Feb., Jane had tickets to see John Mullaney Baby J concert at the BSO. This is the same concert tour that the rest of the family saw him in Chicago in July when the tour began. Mullany focused on his December 2020 drug intervention and his subsequent time in rehab. Netflix filmed the two Boston concerts to make a special of it, which dropped on 25 April. Jane watched Baby J special almost immediately and was ecstatic to discover she was in it...well sort of. At 1 hour and 9 minutes into the special if you have the subtitles on (SOP for the Curti anymore) and it will note "woman cackling" after the following joke:
What are you going to do, cancel John Mullaney?
Cancel him? I'll kill him.... I almost did.
The "woman cackling" is definitely Jane laughing longer and louder than anyone else in the hall (sounds like somebody else we know?).
Our Baby J(ane) cackling her way to being fame adjacent
DC & Worchester or Bust!
Randy drove to Carlisle, PA and then to Washington DC for archival research work the last two weeks in April en route to picking Jane up from school.
Row of Curti across America on the Life 360
The trip allowed him to meet up with Mark Sautman and Brad Kline one night. They ate at Busboys and Poets downtown and visited the FDR and TJ Memorials with the hordes of high school spring trippers. Not as reflective as visiting the memorials on the off times but it was good to see them so crowded at night.
On the weekend, he visited Ellicott City and the Judge's Bench along the National Road with Brad. On the dreary rainy Sunday, he visited the Holocaust Museum and Smithsonian American History. He got a kick of seeing the 3-inch high, plastic President statues he had as a kid, as well as a Spencer Repeating Rifle in one of the Civil War rooms. However, the most enjoyment he found was being filled with snarky outrage at the descriptions identifying the 2.36-inch anti-tank "bazooka" rockets as 60mm rockets. Yes, the measurement is the same, but no GU referred to the bazooka rounds in the metric system except the nitwit that labeled the display. Historians can be such arrogant jerks as they take such happy joy in correcting others about their facts.
Randy Brad and Mark in DC
Randy at National Archives Shrine to Democracy
(Back door entrance for researchers)
Bethany stayed back in STL, so she could continue her every 3-week Herceptin infusion treatment that lasts a year. Herceptin is not chemotherapy, and it doesn't have the negative side effects from poisoning your body. Still, it's an important therapy as it fights HER2-positive breast cancer cell growth and reproduction, greatly diminishing the chances of the cancer coming back. `
Jane's 4th quarter at WPI included her quarter time job for the Civil Engineering Dept., being Treasurer for the Engineers Without Boarders club, and of course classes. However, from her Instagram posts her time was primarily filled with sorority activities. Among her classes was one preparing for her Interactive Qualifying Project (IQP) quarter abroad in the fall. Her 4-person team's IQP topic was Globalizing STEM Education: Developing Exchange Programs for US Students sponsored by the Eastern Switzerland University of Applied Sciences outside of Zurich.
AXD formal with dates
May
As May began, Bethany started her 20 days of radiation treatment (i.e., every weekday for a month). With daily treatments, Bethany wasn't able to join the road trips to pick-up either daughter, as much as she would have liked to. The first day of radiation was easy peasy! They would become progressively more uncomfortable as the month wore on but not as draining as the chemo regime.
Ready to leave for the first day of radiation
Randy drove up from DC to Worcester, MA to pick up Jane (the impetus for driving to DC instead of flying ). Jane gave him another tour of the WPI campus and the Kaven Building for Civil Environmental and Architectural Engineering, where she works in the office.
Outside of the Boynton Hall with plague that reads "Free Institute of Industrial Science"
(insert your favorite Dad joke about the meaning of "free")
We left the next morning heading home, though the drive was hardly relaxed (cruise control rarely engaged) until we got to I-81 paralleling the Blue Ridge Mountains through Virginia. On Saturday, we stopped at the Original 13 Colonies favorite natural wonder/tourist attraction: Natural Bridge, VA. It was a clear favorite of the landscape artist of the period late 1700s and early 1800s based on the number of paintings in art museums. Pretty cool and worth stopping at when in the area but its "must see" bucket list qualities peeked over a hundred or two years ago (Thomas Jefferson owned it for a while). It was surprising to see the 2-lane highway still uses the natural rock bridge as the bridge over the valley (i.e., it was in private ownership until a decade or two ago when the tourist enterprise was going belly up and the State took it over. Definitely not a National Park mentality).
Nice picture of Natural Bridge VA
And mugging at the Natural Bridge
Experiance has shown higher interest in stopping to read the informational kiosk plagues on the trip back UP the hill
Our route took us to Charlotte, NC for the wedding of our former neighbor Charlotte Kennedy to Nick. We didn't get to hang out with her parents Britt and Tina much, but we did spend time with former neighbors the Burks: Dan, Mary, Kathleen, Caroline and George.
Charolotte and Nicks wedding
On the way back home, we bumped into a cultural phenomenon about 110 miles east of Nashville on I-40, as there was a 3-mile-long traffic snarl east bound. What was it you ask? Buckee's at noon on the day after a Taylor Swift concert. The gas pumps, parking lot and inside were packed with legions of young women, many with their mom, decked out in their concert gear. Evidently, they made their free hotel breakfast before it closed down at 10 and hit the road east making it just far enough to need a bathroom, fuel and snack break. It was wild. Even so, Randy made a friend.
Randy and Bucky
Witchita or Bust!
Team Work Makes Dream Work
to get the cleaning deposit back
A few days later, it was back in the car driving the other direction to pick up Cate from Wichita State University. Jane joined Dad to keep him company and see her sister's campus. We stopped in Columbia, MO and enjoyed a terrific lunch at Truman's with Anthony and Lesha. In Wichita, we took Cate to Passage to India, and all enjoyed the Paneer Makani Masalas and naan. Afterwards we finally made it to the local ice cream parlor favorite of Braum's for cones: $5.87 for three cones. Not as rich as premium ice creams (like Serendipity) but a terrific value that made it more of a family value treat like Velvet Freeze used to be in STL in the 1960s and 1970s.
Braums Ice Cream - Yummo!
On Friday, we had all of Cate's stuff loaded up by 11 as required by the dorm. We stopped for lunch at Shakespeare's Pizza in Columbia. Buying pizza by the slice is usually a bad idea and this experience proved that axiom (the slices weren't up to Sam's quality).
Packed up and ready to head home from WSU
Decided to bring Dad back too
On Wednesday, 17 May Randy bought another Triumph Spitfire, but one that ostensibly ran and wasn't quite the project car of June 2022's purchase that has sat in the garage with essentially no progress to speak of. He took off work early and with a cashier's check and cash in hand, he and Jane drove to Cape Girardeau (Jackson) to have a look (Cate had started back at her Serendipity job and was off the hook). It's a red 1969 Mk3 as opposed to the later 1500 versions Randy had in the 1990s or the project car he bought last year. The test drive went OK, and he talked the guy down 15% but the decision to buy it was made more with nostalgic fogged glasses on rather cold, dispassionate logic.
Hey Hon, Spitfire needs a jump
(Note: idiotic grin as reality hasn't sunk in yet)
This became abundantly clear as within one block, we needed the jumper cables so Jane could give him a jump as it stalled while making a left turn. Not unexpected as the seller said it had a bad battery. The real problem came as the car stalled as we left town heading up a hill after being slightly warmed up. Jane following, turned on her hazard lights and after some kibitzing in a parking lot, we decided to take the 2-lane US Highway 61 back home and skipping the 70+ MPH of Interstate 55. That plan quickly died as the car completely stalled out in an undeveloped low trafficked 4 lane with a great shoulder (very safe and secure) just east of the I-55 on ramp. Time for Plan C: calling AAA to give us a tow 105 miles home (fortunately we had the foresight to upgrade to AAA Plus last year with the understanding what Spitfire ownership means). We had a 1.5 hour wait, which allowed us to grab some Whopper Wednesday Impossible Burgers, play on our phones and take pictures. We also enjoyed a beautiful sunset for our drive home before it turned dark.
AAA preparing to tow the Spitfire into the sunset
Afterwards, my car guy Chris Steger wouldn't take the car in to be worked on by his team as except for him, no one had experience working on this type of car and the OJT would be too expensive to swallow (Randy didn't point out that the shop was started by his Dad specifically to fix British sports cars). He did offer to help me on his off time when puttering around the shop. On Saturday, he helped me (aka let me watch) reset the idle speed, putting in new points and resetting the advance, and giving me a spare coil (and the advice to buy new plugs). In the following weeks, my neighbor John identified that the gas at the carburetor smelled off, so replacing the fuel filter that came with the cheap inline electric fuel filter the PO installed along with a new fuel tank and draining the fuel tank lines, seemed the next order of business. The fuel's lack of clarity made it clear that some of the problems at least was bad fuel, which likely clogged the carburetor too. Add to it they were NOT the standard issue SU carbs for the 1969 AND it wasn't a 1969 engine but rather a 1975 1500 engine. This realization curbed my enthusiasm as it took some detective work to determine the nature of this chimera Spitfire I bought without enough skepticism.
Zone of Positivity + 2
Throughout Bethany's cancer treatments, she worked very hard to sustain a Zone of Positivity and it worked very well. When the girls got home it was put to the test with so much togetherness and opinion sharing. Bethany dreamed of a FFF summer of blissful togetherness and Randy kept thinking it was time for the birdlings to be on their own (Definitely channeling cranky dad sitcom vibes like Red from That 70s Show).
Seeing Robin Hood at HiPointe's 50th Anniversary Classics Series
(Oo-de-lally, oo-de-lally, golly, what a day)
Almost immediately, Cate started back at her job as at Serendipity, being the shift lead/manager, which was good. Jane on the other hand, was idle for a month and struggled with the change in tempo after a busy and successful year and semester. She was raring to start her summer job: an internship with the Geotech Branch of the US Army Corps of Engineers. Unfortunately, the Corps wasn't ready for her to start until 5 June as opposed to 8 May as she had hoped for (Those damn commie / terrorist nogoodniks necessitating a thorough background check and review of everyone's fingerprints). On the positive side, she had time and willingness to run lots of errands for her mom who was still limiting her interactions outside the house while continuing cancer treatments. On the negative, she was generally stir crazy.
Jane with Pepper around the fire pit (Dreaming of being at summer camp again instead of home)
June
June began with Bethany's last radiation treatment with the whole family going along with her parents, her sister Rosemary and a couple niblings. Once again B, did a fine job ringing the end of treatment bell.
Ringing the bell for the end of Radiation
Afterwards we went for ice cream at Cold Stone Creamy.
Ice Cream Fete
On Monday 5 June, Jane had her first day at the Corps. She chaffed at the possible presumption of being thought of as a "nepo" (nepotism) baby in getting hired and was hypersensitive to any perceived preferential treatment that might have occurred as a result. It really wasn't more than knowing "a guy" who told her where and when to submit her resume, but perception is reality. Since her dad got in an hour earlier than she was told to arrive and that was her ride, she was noticed waiting in the lobby by the in-processing personnel. This allowed her to get her Common Access Card ID card by 8:30, which was significantly faster than ever happens. Working with another group on a different floor, father and daughter's paths never overlapped during the day except when coming in and leaving together (there's was frequent, discreet Teams texting though).
Jane's ready for first day at USACE
At mid-June Randy met up with a couple fraternity brothers: Jerry Loomstein and Anthony Holmes for the STL Shakespeare Festival's Twelfth Night in Forest Park. It was an absolutely gorgeous night with comfy folding chairs and catching up with old friends.
Randy, Jerry and Anthony
12th Night at Forest Park
Afterwards Anthony and I stopped for the Night at White Castle, the one on Big Bend (and took some home for Bethany). The next morning, we all went to breakfast at the Golden Oak Pancake House in Makenzie Point: excellent food, huge portions, great value, super attentive wait staff. The Bosnian immigrants from the mid-1990s saved South St. Louis.
With White Castle chaos
Stacked display of order and manhood
That Sunday we hosted the Townie Sage Father's and Mother's Day Celebration which pretty much ended the Spring 2023 as the Casa Curti.
The Curtis Clan - Spring 2023
