A selection from
by William Martin
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this is page 181
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contained evidence of cancer. I had imagined the
lymph nodes were about the size of a lima bean,
but they appeared to be about the size of an egg. I
could not help wondering if they weren't something
I would miss. (In fact, they are bean-sized.
What I saw were the egg-sized pads of fat that
surround them.)
The instant pathology exam took about twenty
minutes. Patricia is not the sort to have wanted a
roomful of friends and relatives hovering around
her for hours in the waiting room. On the other
hand, she didn't want to be alone in case the
report on the nodes was a bad one. Rex, the natural
and best choice to wait with her, was there, as
both of us knew he would be. To her surprise,
Fred, a friend from Austin, showed up as well.
But then, no one who knows Fred is ever truly
surprised at his generosity of spirit toward his
friends. He knew the stages of my operation and
had driven 180 miles to be with Patricia until she
got the news about the nodes. As soon as Dr.
Scardino's associate came out to report that the
nodes were clear and the operation would proceed,
he told Rex and Patricia good-bye and headed
back to Austin. Several years ago, doctors discovered
a tumor near the front of Fred's brain. He
and his wife Kathy invited us to spend a few days
with them at South Padre Island over the weekend
before he was to undergo exploratory surgery.
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