At the End of a Fragile Limb

Vance and Gabriel Arnett Nantahala National Forrest: 1998

Just a preliminary note. This is composed of notes and writings in my journal during the period of my son's battle with cancer in the late 90's. When I found it, it gave me some clarity about how I measure my relationships with people and how I handle conflict and stress. Watching someone literally deal with their situation on a day-to-day basis is humbling. Now we could all be humbler. The following is a newer rendition based upon my scribble notes in a journal recently found. He has granted me permission to share this.

(Somewhere around 1998)

I have to write about this now because if I don't, there will be things I need to say that I will not be able to recall. All stories need a setting and the one for this one was the outer office of the State Attorney I worked with. I had just walked into his outer office for a meeting. His secretary stopped me and told me my secretary had transferred a call I needed to take from my son. I said something lame like, "I will call him back after the meeting." She shook her head. "It sounds like you need to take this now." Her tone was firm and she motioned me toward a file room with a phone. "I will transfer it in there." I stepped into the room and picked up the phone just as she quietly closed the door. "Hello Gabriel. What's up?" There was a pause before he answered. Later I would find that he was collecting the breath to power the next statement. "Dad, I have just come from the doctor. I have been diagnosed with melanoma. They say I am at stage 3 whatever that means. I looked it up. This stuff kills you. I just needed to tell you." Time freezes and motion stops right along with breathing. My job was to create words and ease people into new things. I was good at it but nothing came to mind in this situation. I was hearing something no parent wants to hear. No one wants to outlive their child. I gathered my scattering wits that were desperately headed in different directions. "What does the doctor say the next move is?" "I have to start on a course of drugs as soon as possible. He is referring me to a cancer clinic at Emory. I guess I will learn more there. Dad, this stuff is fatal in 75% of the cases. There will be a couple of surgeries. I already had one when they took the mole then I have to start chemo-therapy like granddad did. They are going to map every dark mark on my body and monitor everything." I'm not sure I am remembering this as it happened so I hope Gabe forgives me if he ever reads this. Hell, I probably won't even have the date right. "Do you need me to come up there?" Now, I see what a stupid question that was. It should have been a declarative statement. "I'm on my way." But it wasn't and later I would find out that shock is a horrible thing to try to "think" your way through and second guessing your actions are foolhardy. Gabe was more together than I was. "Maybe. Let's wait until I know more and then maybe. Right now, I have to get back to work but I just thought you might want to know." The next few days were a whirlwind. We had other conversations. I rattled on about how the statistics were skewed toward older populations and that he was young. Even though we had both been through the cancer grist mill with his mother and his granddad, somehow that had not totally prepared us for this or at least me for this. His mother and I had split up almost ten years earlier. Everyone had moved on. It seemed like just months earlier I had helped him move to Atlanta to find a new career. He was young, strong, independent, a good surfer and an active young man. He had received his education on his own through veterans' benefits. This wasn't supposed to happen to him, not to my Gabe. It finally dawned on me that there really was nothing to be said that listening was more important. He was assigned a mentor at Emory, a young guy that had been through the treatment before. That seemed to help. He had a doctor that was honest and straight forward and willing to use Gabe's strength and conditioning to increase his capability to fight the disease. They removed everything that looked like it was more than a freckle and some freckles were probably removed. Through all of this Gabe was particularly non-specific about what he was going through. I kept listening but he was handling this on his own terms. I was not doing so well. I would have moments when I couldn't function. I had a close colleague tell me how sorry she was and that I must be terrified. I wasn't. I was paralyzed, that deer in the headlights everyone talks about. I could still function but I know there are whole conversations I missed even with Gabe. My wife Jane, suggested that I just take Gabe and go somewhere just the two of us and try to relax. We had friends who had a house in North Carolina that they offered. I called Gabe and arranged to fly up to Atlanta and pick him up. I booked two full days of fly fishing. Mr. 'Efficient to the Rescue' here didn't even think about things like his stamina, or his eating restrictions or how nauseous a car trip might make him. I had never seen him vulnerable. He had already been through so much. I just plunged ahead and soon we were sitting in the living room on top of Scaly Mountain just outside of Highlands, North Carolina staring at each other. We had picked up food but we were both too tired to worry about much. As luck would have it, a hornet’s nest had taken up residence in a dear head hanging over the couch. Of course, he was sitting under it and was stung within a matter of minutes after the air started flowing. I panicked as he remained calm. He laughed as we put ice on it and found some Benadryl in a medicine cabinet. "Dad, take it easy. Believe me, this sting is nothing." The next day we met our guide and headed west for too long a drive for a young man on treatment. He later admitted he felt like he was going to vomit the whole way. We got there and the guy was not the perfect guide. He was frustrated with my rusty casts and Gabe was a novice. Even though he got his cast in fairly good shape, the fish were safe on the Nantahala that day. We had dinner that night but I could tell he felt lousy. He was a good sport about it and we decided that we would see what the next day held. One the second day, the guide was younger and I had a talk about driving distance and explained Gabe's situation. That day turned into magic. I stepped into the background. I let the guide take Gabe and give him the emotional support he needed. We went to reasonable places to fish within short driving distances and he insisted that Gabe ride up front. We took extra time getting into our neoprene waders. Remember, Gabe was a surfer so neoprene was much more familiar to him that my ancient Red Ball waders. I stood on the far side of the river just watching and snapping photos. You would have thought I had landed a prize trout when Gabe netted his first rainbow. I couldn't fish. I couldn't do anything but watch my son slowly lose himself in the words of his guide and the flow of the river and think about him. I felt like I was hanging on the end of a narrow branch of the family tree. Gabe was an only child by our choice. I had agreed to a vasectomy after his mother had endured a hard delivery. Several years later she would go through her own battle with cancer. She was a fighter and endured. I thought how much I hoped Gabriel had inherited that quality from her. But at that point, he was it. The end of the limb for my crazy mixed up lineage. He had already told me they had taken the necessary steps to ensure that if his treatment rendered him sterile, he would still have options. I can't tell you that was comforting because it was overshadowed by the darkness of the shadow that had created the whole need. I was adopted into the Arnett jamboree. Gabe was the one born into it and the thought of losing him and his future was almost all I could bear. If I hadn't been standing in ice cold water with a decent enough flow that I had to concentrate on remaining upright, I would have fallen in a heap. I wish I could say that trip ended great. It didn't. As we got closer to Atlanta and the reality that Gabe faced there, it became more and more difficult for him. I somehow was comforted by the anger because I felt it was a real reaction to where he was and what he was going through. I felt it would help him get through to the other side of treatment. As for my own thoughts, you never let go of that fear no matter. how many years pass after you get the all clear. The disease is like an unwanted house guest that refuses to leave totally because it endures in your memory. All diseases are a challenge and certainly there are people who are faced with more hopeless diagnoses than he had. It doesn't matter in this head or in this heart it is as real as air still. Cancer happens forever and it is up to everyone to resurrect hope in order to carry on. Hope and taking each day as it comes are the only tools you find yourself with. I remember him saying once if he didn't say it a thousand times, "It is what it is, right now. This too will pass." 2020

It did. Time passed but the elder had become the student. I learned a great deal from him during that time. He would continue to be monitored and have to go through more surgery and treatment for years. He never stopped moving forward with way more courage than I possessed from the sideline. He moved to New York City and received care from Memorial Sloan Kettering. He would meet the woman who would become his wife. They would fall in love, get married, and have four healthy beautiful children. To this day he gets checked regularly but with each year, the branch of that tree has grown thicker and more stable. Gabriel has not only become successful in his job but is a great father. He and his wife spend a great deal of time supporting their kids in the school and the community. The pandemic raged around them in the spring of this year. They stayed calm, kept the family focused and spent time making sure no one got too far behind. So why do I write this now? It gives me perspective for the current pandemic situation. As a writer, perspective is everything. It sets your characters, your scenes, the action, the process of your story, all of it. So sometimes, it is very good to check your own story. What lives and breathes there is the foundation of how you help others. Support can be active or passive and it doesn't have to be acknowledged. It just has to be to make a difference. So, what about that tree limb? At 72, I'm still hanging on firmly. I get to see him about every other year with his family. I get to see what the world would have missed if for one moment, he would have given in. I'm very thankful he didn't.

Age six in my Elvis Shirt at the Gulbranson in New Port News, VA

At three no way to reach the pedals.