Reflections on Day 1 at MDA

The call to come to Houston came on September 11, 2009—eight years after death came from the sky in New York, D.C., and Shankstown, Pennsylvania. Was this a call to life—from the skies of phone towers?
Interesting that we were not given an appointment time—just to be in Houston Monday. And, with the call coming at 9:30 on a work day AND including a request for numerous medical reports from Lubbock AND with many medical offices closing at noon on Fridays; we got busy. Judy scrambled the phones, I picked up pathology slides and other things and ended up faxing over 40 pages of documents. We made our deadlines but by the skin of our teeth.
Next decision: fly or drive? Last minute flights are more expensive and we weren’t sure when we would be coming home. Driving seemed to make more sense—to us. Our friends said we were crazy, which was confirmation that we needed to drive. Since when have we done things the sane way?
How much do we pack for a 2-3-4-5 day trip? We made arrangements to be gone a couple of days, thinking we’d be back home late Tuesday night. MAJOR MISUNDESTANDING OF THE SYSTEM.
Friday night and Saturday were blurred by our preparations. I wanted to leave immediately after church. Come home, change clothes and grab a burger on the way out of town. (And the forecast called for snow in hell the same day.) We finally got off around 2:00, still eating in the car. The skies were overcast and we drove in rain most of the way. Radio stations were rare—that is, stations we could tolerate were rare. We finally found one that featured “Country Legends.” It was more than country and we laughed at some of the selections making the legends chart. We arrived just before midnight at the Barry Wallace estate.
Monday morning—up at 6:15—6:22—6:30—6:33 and the realization that Brandon would be there at 7:45 to drive us on his way to work. Amazing thing, this adrenalin rush—better than caffeine to get you going. Brandon arrived on time and we entered into that highly entertaining and competitive sport of Houston rush hour traffic—something I try to avoid like the plague whenever we go to Houston. Brandon handled it all in stride driving, texting, shifting and drinking coffee while maintaining a calm conversational tone. We arrived at 8:10 with time to spare????how can that be—we don’t know when we’re to be there. Are we really early or late or…?
Brandon established a new paradigm for hospital appointments. He’s a doctor—arranged for us to come to MDA, picked us up, parked in the doctor’s parking lot, escorted us through the labyrinth of buildings and took us right up to the registration counter. He waited at the desk to be sure the lady behind the counter realized we were there and being escorted by a doctor.
As we walked through the MDA complex—traveling through a sky bridge that’s nearly a quarter mile long, I remembered out vacation trip to Boston. We took one of the guided tours that included Cambridge, Massachusetts. The looney driver took us by M.I.T. and commented, “This campus is huge—it covers 13 acres.” M.D. Anderson Medical Center could swallow M.I.T. and not burp. The guide bragged about there being more Nobel Prize winners at M.I.T. than at any other school. Who cares if they can’t help my wife? MDA is where we need and I want to be.
We discovered our appointment was for 10:30, so we had some waiting to do. The registration clerk said she would let “Bill” know we were here and maybe we could get started a little early. We settled down in the spacious waiting—spacious, peaceful waiting—spacious, peaceful, quiet waiting room. What a contrast to the drive to MDA. I began journaling and Judy began her never ending search for a cup of coffee. (Usually she is searching for that elusive perfect cup of coffee, but this was a hospital and searching for coffee of any kind would have to suffice.) She found her coffee—all’s right with the world. She spilled her coffee on herself—all’s normal with the world.
9:28: “Judy Gerlt.” She and Bill walk away and our next round in the tumbler began.
As I was by myself in this spacious, peaceful, quiet waiting room, I reflected on our journey of the past few hours. We just knew to come to Houston. We didn’t know where M.D. Anderson hospital was located nor where to go when we arrived. The complex is indeed complex. And the very fact that we were there was a little staggering. Actually, I began to compare Brandon going ahead of us to Joseph of the Old Testament going ahead of his family to Egypt. He went ahead to provide life for his family. Somehow it seems like Brandon has gone ahead of us to provide life for my precious coffee spilling, music loving, want-to-experience-it-all—but –didn’t-mean-this-experience wife of 39 years. “Thank You, Father, for Your foresight in bringing this man into our family and calling him to medical school. Thank you for loading him up with the brain power to graduate number 1 in his class and in all his residency and internship programs so he’d be selected for M.D. Anderson. Thank you for his compassion for extended family.”