honey I'm home

A winter's tale, could be the first in a series.  For context, see Time Management for the Bereaved Computer Programmer

       "Honey, I'm Home"

    Some big decisions 
are made in moments, one per day for months.  
    Here it comes again. 
Walk through the door into a darkened, silent place, 
    where she will never be again?  
Or veer away, a stone skipped off a pond?
    He'd hated it before,
in the house alone, even for a week.
    She knew this,
worried more for him as she grew weaker. 
    Typical Jean. 
She stopped worrying, and everything else, 
    eight months ago.  
Plus three weeks.  Plus one day.

    He does enter, 
notices a bookcase photo glowing, nods.
    She's with Anne
at a hospice courtyard picnic, last time ever out of bed.
    Her face, bloated by steroids; 
Her eyes, hollowed by tumor.  He’s puzzled. 
    What luminous about that? 
He flips through the deck of her virtues: 
    gentle, intelligent, 
stops at courageous.  That's the one.  She knew
    what waited for her.
She's looking directly at it.  

    Inspired, he tightropes 
to the kitchen, faces the fridge where
    she's pinned by magnets;
backpacking in college days;
    hair short after radiation,
staring down the camera; in Hawaii,
    smiling, confident,
two months before the tumor came back.

    Crouched by his food bowl, 
Clark meets his eyes, and for another glowing moment
    he thinks the cat wants to talk,
is concerned for his mental health.  
    Those fears are groundless. 
He fills Clark's bowl, opens the fridge, scans the shelves 
    for what won't need cooking. 
He wants to make it through the winter 
    without turning on the heat.  
No big deal, Alameda seldom freezes; 
    late January, 
the first blossoms appear.

Time Management for the Bereaved Computer Programmer

After a summer writing mostly letters to Jean, I started a grief writing group in October.  As the name suggests, it combines a writing workshop with group counseling, with differences from each. Unlike writing workshops, this group values writing as it facilitates the grieving process; the point is to explore emotions, not to prepare for publication.  And unlike other counseling groups, this one has a strangely anonymous feel; some of the questions you typically have about people are impolite to ask.  For example, based on the quality of the writing -- can't help but notice -- I suspect not all of us are amateurs. But profession would be an awkward topic to raise, it crosses the boundary of knowing each other chiefly as people coming to terms with loss(es).  I'm not objecting; there is a stimulating, leveling something about being forced to relate to fellow humans on the basis of a terrible, not-quite-inevitable commonality.

Every week we get writing suggestions, such as "describe or imagine your beloved's final hours," along with examples of poems showing how much can be done with that approach.  Notable among these examples are excerpts from Without by Donald Hall, a collection of poems clustered around Hall's experience of losing his wife Jane Kenyon to leukemia.  Without consists of twenty-one short-line free-verse poems, twenty of which tell the story in chronological order.  The exception, Her Long Illness, winds around the first seven poems until arriving at the end of that illness, and the poem that lends its title to the book.  In addition to being much longer than any of the others, Her Long Illness looks different on the page because the lines are grouped into couplets of a short line of about three stresses, then a long line of around five. Hall has a preference for end-stop lines, and at times I suspect an iambic intent.

Hall's tone is conversational, direct, unaffected; like it, reminds me of Jean.  It's possible to read distractedly past one of his beautiful images, then wonder about the power of simple language after something tugs at your eye and says backup.  As in the last stanza of Letter in Autumn, about visiting Jane's grave:
... 

  Looking south
    from your stone, I gaze at the file
    of eight enormous sugar maples
    that rage and flare in dark noon,
    the air grainy with mist
    like the rain of Seattle's winter.
    The trees go on burning 
    without ravage of loss or disorder.
    I wish you were that birch
    rising from the clump behind you,
    and I the grey oak alongside.

    -- from Without by Donald Hall

But in my opinion, the most powerful lines belong to Her Long Illness.  In this excerpt, after Jane's hematologist told them "I have terrible news," they're working together on selecting poems for a collection, and on writing an obituary:

    ...he saw how weak she felt
and said maybe not now; tomorrow?
    Jane shook her head: "Now," she said.
"We have to finish it now."
    Later, as she slid exhausted into sleep,
she said "Wasn't that fun?
    to work together?  Wasn't that fun?"

    -- from Without by Donald Hall

Another Jean reminder.  Some of the sweetest marital moments of the technical editor and the computer programmer were when they worked together on their writing, and it was indeed fun, and they kept at it even after Jean entered Zen Hospice. Kept going until nearing the end of the sequence described in this stanza a few pages later:

One by one they came,
    the oldest and dearest, to say goodbye
to this friend of the heart.
    At first she said their names, wept and touched;
then she smiled; then
    turned one mouth-corner up.  On the last day
she stared silent goodbyes
    with her hands curled and her eyes stuck open.

    -- from Without by Donald Hall

This could sound unbearably familiar, if you've ever been inducted into the hospice club.  And if you questioned our group's use of writing as therapy, imagine you were Hall, and somebody in your writing group compliment you on how the quiet images in these lines built to a wrenching crescendo.  Which of course they do, and you’d revised and revised to make it so.  But she's still gone, and part of you died with her; you might not be in the mood for praise.

As for me, most weeks I've struggled to tell what it was like to be married to Jean, and to avoid talking about what it's like now.  Part II of that formula gets no prize for emotional authenticity; perhaps writing poems in the manner of _Her Long Illness_ would help me look in both directions?  Worst case, the format is possible to imitate/fake within a week; and if the writing doesn't work either as poetry or therapy, the plot is simple, so the reader can quickly move.

There's only poem remotely blog-ready at Thanksgiving time 2013, but more could come, and Time Management for the Bereaved Computer Programmer seems a clever working title for a series. Too clever? But grief does focus you on time: wishing it could run backwards; wondering if it really heals wounds and whether, in all truth, you want to be healed.  If you look at the Without table of contents with the male penchant for keeping score, you can count three titles that name seasons, three others that name holidays, one that names a specific date, and two an indeterminate time span (Last Days and Her Long Illness). Do nine time-related titles out of twenty-one constitute a significant trend?  If not, and mixing poetry with time management is just silly, at least daydreams of a poetry collection provides an opportunity to promote Hall's book.

   

Pictures from Jean's Ann Arbor Memorial, June 9, 2013

A version on this post with an account of what people said at the memorial will be coming later this week. But for now, enjoy the pictures.

Gathering for the memorial.  Front row Ray Lewis; next row Laurie
Abbott; next row Anne Lewis; back row from left to right: Phill Stoll, Pat Sutton,
Yao Louis, Yao's daughter Sally, and Yao's sister and  mother;
walking in back: Jeff Taras.

Babak "Shadie" Rowshan

Anne Lewis

Ray Lewis

Phil Stoll

Phil playing fiddle

Laurie Abbott

Yao Louis with Anne Lewis for support

 

Amy Garber

Ellen McCarthy

Will Lovick

Pat Sutton

Iris Wiinikka

John Hogen

Bouquets on reception table

Present in spirit.
With Matt in 2012, after returning from her Hawaii vacation
with Anne, before finding out that the tumor was back.

The evening before the memorial, we gathered at the home of Ellen McCarthy and Will Lovick to reminisce and make plans.

On backyard stairs leading down to the creek
Amy, Yao, Anne, Phil, Will, Ray

Closer to the creek: Yao (cropped), Amy,
Laurie, Ellen, Pat, Shadie 

NBTS Donate 2013

It's not too late to donate even after the Bay Area Brain Tumor walk.  Use the link below and remember Jean and Jonathan and help the cause 

Donate to Jean and Jonathan's National Brain Tumor Society Fundraising Team

Obituary for Mickey Pico by his daughter Sasha

Mickey's daughter Sasha wrote a moving tribute to her dad, including a photo of Mickey at his bagel stand, for the online edition of the Juneau Empire.  Many people have read it, and left comments saying that they appreciated Sasha's words, and that Mickey meant a lot to them.  Please read it and add your signature to the guest book!

A Knight in Tattered Armor

Mickey's Bagel Bistro, Juneau Alaska
Mickey took great ride in his bagel stand, and
always thought of it was one of his finest achievements.

My older brother Mickey Pico died Sunday May 12 around 5 am while in hospice care at the Sutter Medical Center in Santa Rosa, 15 years after he was diagnosed with hepatitis C, less than a year after the doctors discovered he had liver cancer. He was 65 years old. His funeral will be Thursday, May 16, at 10 am, in the Garden of Tranquility at Oakmont Memorial Cemetery, 2099 Reliez Valley Road in Lafayette.  He is survived by his 12 year-old daughter Sasha, and his estranged wife Joni.

Mickey was never a home owner.  He loved to take road trips, and his belongings are scattered at friends' houses up and down the Pacific coast, where he deposited them over the past year.

The way Mickey lived his life is actually part of a Pico family tradition, exemplified by our dad, Charlie Pico, whose grave is just a few feet from where Mickey will be buried.

Similar to his dad, Mickey was a street vendor, and ran a popular bagel stand in Juneau Alaska for many years.  His appearance was striking.  He often would shave his head to show empathy for friends and family members going through chemotherapy and favored Bermuda shorts.  A different look that gave a message that went something like "The most important thing is to tune-in to the pain of others. You can always find a way to survive, and do that while conceding very little to convention."

Survive he did.  Mickey always had a job, but sometimes his living arrangements were Spartan.  There were times in Alaska -- Alaska! -- when he actually slept in storage space he rented, using the YMCA for a bathroom and shower.  The family thought in some ways that he was trying saying he could be as resilient as dad, and we got the point: Mickey was tough.

They were also similar in their generous spirits. One thing that everyone noticed about Mickey was that he never ignored a pan-handler, and he always gave them paper, not coins.

Mickey and Joni's marriage floundered after he was diagnosed with hepatitis C.  They separated, and Mickey started to put energy into taking care of mom.  It turned out that he had many qualities of an excellent caregiver.  He was always patient and accepting. while encouraging mom to try to do as much as possible for herself.  Best of all, he really loved her, and always gave her the sense that caring for her was exactly what he wanted to do with his life.

This arrangement was hard to maintain after mom became too sick to stay in her home.  Mickey slept on the floor beside her bed in the hospital, so she wouldn't be scared and alone if she woke up in the middle of the night. The result was back pain so severe he needed to be hospitalized at John Muir.  While he was there, he told a social worker he had not been getting enough to eat.  That was not something he shared with anybody in the family; I just found out when Sutter asked John Muir for his medical records.

Esther died in February 2012.  Mickey and I were co-trustees of her trust, and Mickey had the task of preparing the family house for sale. He did a good job and we ended up getting a good price.  Afterwards, Mickey immediately set about spending his share of the proceeds according to his principles, without consulting anyone.  He bought a gravestone for mom, and memorial plaques for her and her sister Lillian at Temple Isaiah.  He made a contribution to the Bay Area Brain Tumor Walk in honor of my wife Jean.  He gave a few thousand each to two women who had provided care and companionship for Esther.  He made a 40K undocumented cash loan to a woman he used to work with at Costco whom he felt sorry for because she was a breast cancer survivor..  By January of this year he had spent his inheritance.  Joni and Sasha were not entirely pleased.

But they were still the two people closest to him, and this April he decided he would drive down from Juneau to spend Mothers Day with them in Champagne, Illinois. He came through the Bay Area on his way, to check-in with family here.  On Friday, April 19 we had lunch together in Concord.  We had a pleasant chat, and although his voice was a bit faint he did not seem noticeable worse than before.  He told me he would be staying a few days at the Motel 6 before heading east.

On Friday May 3 Joni called to say Mickey was in the Sutter Medical Center in Santa Rosa, after being found walking around dazed near his car following a minor accident.  She and Sasha flew out to California on Sunday, and the three of us drove up to visit Mickey.  He was in the ICU, mostly unresponsive, but occasionally becoming agitated, pulling on his restraints and yelling "Let me out of here."  However, he became aware of Sasha's presence after she was in the room with him for a few hours, looked at her with recognition, and told his daughter that he loved her.

The Sutter doctors found that Mickey's liver function was almost completely gone, and as a result his kidneys had collapsed.  They were never entirely sure why his mental state had deteriorated. One theory was that it could be related to a possible stomach infection, and he was given antibiotics until the bacterial cultures came back negative.  Another was that it was caused by a buildup of protein bodies, a long-standing problem for which he took lactulose. Those protein body levels were high when Mickey entered the hospital, but he was no more alert after they administered lactulose and brought them down within normal range.  With those theories shot down, they decided that his mental condition was part of the systemic failure caused by the progression of his cancer.

In January Mickey had signed advanced directives saying he did not want to be resuscitated, that he wanted "comfort care" if the doctors decided that he was approaching the end.  Once antibiotics and lactulose proved ineffective, Sutter switched to comfort care, and he was disconnected from all his IVs.  If you've never seen anyone terminally ill, this approach can seem anything but comfortable.  It meant that Mickey received no fluids and nutrition, which according to common sense seems cruel.  But he was not dehydrated, fluids were accumulating in his extremities, and they could not feed him for fear that he would aspirate.  The major medication he received in his last days was morphine, to make his breathing easier.

On Saturday May 11 I cleaned out the Dodge Caravan that Mickey had been driving when he had his accident.  He had been sleeping in his car, not just at the Motel 6.  But he had been too proud to tell me about it, just like he wouldn't say he needed more food when he was caring for Esther at the hospital.  His last living circumstances had been harsh.

That evening in Mickey hospital room, one of the nurses brought Sasha a flute.  She gave us all a long concert while Joni and I sat in a meditative silence, and Mickey lay unresponsive.  Then Joni and Sasha went back to their hotel, and I sat and held Mickey's hand for several hours, telling him family news and appreciations that I doubt he understood.  Around 5 am two of the staff came to turn him on his back, and when I saw him open his eyes I started in again with what seemed to need to be said.  "Your vexing kid brother is here with you," I told him, "your beloved daughter Sasha has come to visit, and we all love you for being a free wheelin' travelin' man, crazy generous, living for principles, very, very good to mom."  I thought his eyes brows twitched, maybe this time it got through. Then he passed.  He had made it to Mothers Day.

The team t-shirts will be ready by April 24

t-shirt front

t-shirt back

The design is complete for our Brain tumor walk team t-shirts, and we have been quoted a delivery date of April 24.  A special thanks to the artist, Rik Livingston, for his talent and patience, and for completing the design despite having serious health issues in his own family.  Thanks also to several friends and a family member who contributed their time, expertise, and money to make these shirts happen: Debra Caldwell, Suzanne Restuch, Anne Lewis, Linda Ruddiman,  Mei-yao Louis, Karen Creech, Matt Garber, and Nick Galloro.


If you would like one of these shirts, simply show up at Speedway Meadows in Golden Gate Park on Saturday May 4, and walk with our team.  Anyone who donates at least $15 to the team can also get a shirt, just send email to Matt at 1853wsvm@gmail.com and ask for one. 

Click here if would like to to donate and/or signup for our team:  Glio Warriors for Jean and Jonathan

The gardens look a lot better after last weekend

Lindy Ruddiman and Kevin Hansen,
in the vastly improved Wood St. backyard

Those of you who have visited on Wood Street in recent months doubtless retain a vivid impression of the sad state of Jean's garden projects.  For example, it would have been painfully accurate to describe the area adjacent to the garage as a jumble of weeds and potted roses, plus a persimmon tree that had outgrown its pot and seemed determined to stay put.  And then there was the orchard, where the weeds were even higher, and after many years without pruning, the fruit trees sported a tangle of crossover branches.  Not to mention the side yard, hard to even walk through with the rose canes arcing six feet from the neighbor's fence right up to the the house, and coils of crabgrass underfoot.

Last weekend saw some improvements. On Saturday Nick Galloro came over, rolled up his sleeves, and by the time he left the side yard was a paragon of verdant decorum.  Crabgrass gone; one could stroll from one end of the house to the other on a wide swath of landscape fabric, without a rose prickle even coming close.  John Gregorin and Susan Torngren came over too, working in the backyard.  Weeds gone; there are now three slightly elevated plantings, containing the roses that used to be in pots.  And after a mighty effort, that persimmon tree now has a permanent home at the back of orchard, near what we Alamedans call the green belt.

More friends came Sunday.  Lindy Ruddiman and Kevin Hansen went out to the orchard and pruned the apple trees. Kevin also drew up plans useful for installing an automatic sprinkling system, on that blessed day when the Wood St irrigation technology becomes more contemporary.  And Ted and Noah Hayes came over and staked down landscape fabric on areas of the backyard that John and Sue cleared Saturday, but which have not yet been planted.  The photo shows Lindy and Kevin posing by the handiwork of John, Sue, Ted, and Noah.

Thanks to all seven of you for your help.  Of course much remains to be done, much.  But after long months of neglect, the gardens have a fresh start.

   

Jean Lewis Memorial, February 24, 2013

Jean in our backyard
from Oakmont album circa 2008

As sad as it was, the memorial seemed to end to soon, as if we could keep Jean around as long as we kept talking about her.  And the occasion had some 21st century problems that would have greatly annoyed her: technical difficulties at the mortuary prevented showing the digital photo album on which Jean's sister Anne had worked long and hard, or playing the songs which Jean had selected when she went into the hospice.  However,  Oakmont did offer amends by putting some photos of Jean on their web site; click here to see them all:  Oakmont album

On vacation in Hawaii
from Oakmont album, March 2012

Anne and Jean enjoying themselves  on Maui
from Oakmont album, March 2012

The two sisters on vacation in Maine, August 2011

In contrast to the high tech problems,  the traditional music provided by John Gregorin and Susan Torngren worked wonderfully, especially "Two Rivers," the first waltz played at Matt & Jean's wedding almost 15 years ago.  And there was a magical moment at the end of the service, when the Unitarian chaplain, Nada Nelimirovic, led the assemblage in huming the Dick Van Dyke theme song.  It was a song Jean had learned last March when her sister Anne took her to Maui on one of her all-time great vacations, and she often hummed it herself over the next months when her spirtis flagged.  For those of you who only know the instrumental version of this American classic, here are the lyrics:

So you think that you've got troubles? 
Well, trouble's a bubble, 
So tell old Mr. Trouble to "Get lost!". 

Why not hold your head up high and, 
Stop cryin', start tryin', 
And don't forget to keep your fingers crossed. 

When you find the joy of livin' 
Is lovin' and givin' 
You'll be there when the winning dice are tossed. 

A smile is just a frown that's turned upside down, 
So smile, and that frown will defrost. 
And don't forget to keep your fingers crossed!

These were the speakers, in order of appearance. Matt, Yao, Derek,  Tara,  Pam and Mary Ann have provided provided written versions of their remarks, and we hope to also publish the eulogies by Greg and Phil.

Matt Pico  husband

Yao Louis  old friend of Jean since they were classmates  at Huron High in Ann Arbor [read by Nada Velimirovic]
  
Derek McCulloch colleague of Jean's at URS

Tara McCulloch Derek's wife and also a good friend of the family

Pam Cory  Jean's colleague dating back to their Dames and Moore days in the early 1990s.

Gregg Lowery rosarian and editor of Rosaumdi, the journal of the Heritage Rose Foundation.
  
Phil Cushway first folk danced with Jean when she was at Huron High.

Mary Ann Koory  led the novel writing workshop in which Jean was enrolled at the time the tumor was discovered in April 2011.

Matt Pico

Jean and Matt
from Oakmont album

At Feel Good Bakery, Alameda Market Place, May 2012

We're here to celebrate Jean's life, and a few people who knew her well will talk to you about what made her a wonderful person.  Remarkably, it will all be true.  Her family and friends did not decide she was intelligent, creative, and compassionate when it came time to write her eulogy.  And these were not qualities that Jean would ever brag about it in stories she told about herself. We had to discover them for ourselves, and once discovered, that understanding stuck. We showed what we thought by keeping close through the last difficult days of her illness.  Jean had a constant stream of visitors at the hospice, gathered around her bedside in what often felt like impromptu parties.  Her sister Anne was with her when she passed, holding her right hand while I held the left, making sure she did not suffer.

My debt to Jean is one topic I can't leave to the other speakers.  The short version is - I lucked out.  People tell you don't rely on someone changing just because they're in a relationship; count on the opposite.  But somehow we brought out the best in each other, and for 15 years we flourished, beyond any expectation I had of what the world could offer.

There's an anecdote I like that shows what our marriage felt like.  Jean the editor heard it often enough to insist I stop repeating myself, but hopefully she'll tolerate one more telling.

Soon after our wedding, we were working together in the garden, Jean troweling around a rose bush.  Suddenly she squealed in delight, and held a squirming something into the sunlight for me to see: she had discovered that earthworms were iridescent.

For me that image captured her, captured us.  Jean loved her roses, but she also found beauty in the everyday, the overlooked, humble creatures doing the work of the world.  To us we were two such creatures, quiet, undramtic, allergic to pretense, a good time often meaning a good conversation.  Always happy to be married.  The kisses stayed hot until the very end.

We're also here to mourn Jean's passing.  At times many of us will be pulled under by grief, but a few of use will need to struggle to make it back up to the surface.  That type might say "sure" when you tell them to take care of themselves, with no intention of doing anything so utterly pointless.  It was a type that marked Jean's life with some painful losses, and for whom she always had a special concern; they were the theme of the novel she was working on when her tumor was discovered.  For anyone here today feeling overwhelmed by sadness, I have something to say, especially for you, from Jean.

I want to recite one of her favorite poems, one that we always thought would be perfect to read when the occasion was letting go of grief. But thinking about it lately, it might help at the entrance to the tunnel too, holding out hope.  Whether it actually does, whether anything could, who can say.  But try to listen, it will be over quickly, and if you're saying to yourself "poetry!  forget it," you may be surprised.  This one goes down almost as easily as prose.

The Change 
  Denise Levertov

For years the dead
were the terrible weight of their absence,
the weight of what one had not put in their hands.
Rarely a visitation--dream or vision--
lifted that load for a moment, like someone
standing behind one and briefly taking
the heft of a frameless pack.
But the straps remained, and the ache--
though you can learn not to feel it
except when malicious memory 
pulls downward with sudden force.
Slowly there comes a sense
that for some time the burden
has been what you need anyway.
How flimsy to be without it, ungrounded, blown
hither and thither, colliding with stern solids.
And then they begin to return, the dead:
but not as visions. They're not 
separate now, not to be seen, no
it's they who see: they displace
for seconds, for minutes, maybe longer,
the mourner's gaze with their own.  Just now,
that shift of light, arpeggio 
in iridescence -- 
not the accustomed bearer 
of heavy absence saw it, it was perceived 
by the long-dead, long-absent, 
looking out from within one's opened eyes.

Note: In preparing for the memorial, I misheard two lines near the end, apologies to the poet.  The actual version that Levertov wrote was:

...that shift of light, arpeggio 
* on ocean's harp -- 
not the accustomed bearer 
of heavy absence saw it, it was perceived 
by the long-dead, long-absent, 
* looking out from within one's wideopen eyes.

Jean (in Monterey?)
from Oakmont album, circa 2009

from Oakmont Album

Yao Louis

I have been friends with Jean since high school. We reconnected in college and have been close friends ever since. It was Jean that had the idea to take a month and hike on the Appalachian Trail, and to form a rock band, learn how to play instruments, and have a party to showcase our talents. We also became known among our friends for giving dinner parties that included homemade ice cream and champagne. She was so smart, with many talents. She loved music and we fell in love with various bands, and got to see some of them in person - The Clash and Boy George among them. I have so many wonderful memories of Jean.  But the remembrance I treasure most is her compassion for me. During a tragic time, she seemed to know how I felt and supported me through it. I would have been adrift if not for her. Thank you, Jean, for being the best friend that I could wish for. I love you very much.

Jean and her mom Sylvia.  Sylvia entered deep old age

around 2007, and Jean often went back to the family home

 in Ann Arbor to help

Oakmont album

Jean with Will and Millie Thomas, two old friends of the Lewis family. Starting in the early 1950s, the Lewises and the Thomases had dinner together every Christmas. At a time when few women went to college, Millie Thomas and Sylvia Lewis both had Masters degrees.  Oakmont album

Derek McCulloch

Jean and I worked together at the same company for a long time.  So long I’m not even sure how long…we went away and came back three times between us, so it’s hard to figure out all the overlaps.  But more than 15 years, fewer than 20.  And in that time, we made the transition from work acquaintances to family friends.

If you don’t know, Jean worked as a technical editor at a multidisciplinary consulting engineering firm.  What that means is, she took prose written by engineers and planners and scientists – written, often, by people who would tell you themselves had no business writing prose of any kind – and she would help make that prose comprehensible to the lay public, or really to anybody who relies on such niceties as verb-subject agreement.

Jean was very good at her job.  She would untangle illogical constructions and disordered thoughts, and take poor, abused, misused words and restore to them their clarity and purpose.  She improved every document she read.  Or more simply, she made things better.

I’ve been thinking about Jean a lot lately, and it’s struck me that “she made things better” is a pretty good summary of a recurrent theme.  She would take plants that wouldn’t grow, and make them thrive.  She’d take in lost and sick animals, and care for them, and as much as possible she’d make them well.  If her friends were in difficulty, she would try, however she could, to help make things better.

I’m hardly the person here most qualified to comment on this, but Jean always seemed to me to be an extraordinarily sensitive person.  I think the troubles of others weighed on her more than they would a less empathic person.  If her friends or family had pain and unhappiness, it caused her pain and unhappiness.  And she would try, however she could, to make things better.

Jean set an example I know I, for one, don’t live up to.  But my feeling now is that the best way to honour and keep her memory would be if we were all—all of us—resolved to always try, in the ways we know how, to make things better.

Jean in our kitchen at 1853 Wood St, April 27, 2011. 

She had the operation to remove the brain tumor the next day. 

The dot on her forehead is a surgical marker.

After the operation, friends responded to a call for help to put up

a gardening shed in our backyard. May 15, 2011. 

Top row: Jean, Ted Hayes

Middle row: Dan Hakim, Pamela Michaud, Sherry Weise, Ira Weise

Bottom row: Karl, Charlie, and Guille Freschl

Jean's berry patch in our backyard, designed and implemented

with the devoted help of John Gregorin and Susan Torngren, summer 2011. 

Jean often used found elements, such as pieces of concrete,

in her garden constructions.

Tara McCulloch

The poem I will read was written in the late 18th century by Scotland's national poet, Robert Burns, who is known for writing in Scot's dialect.  It is simply titled Jean, and is a tribute to Burns' wife, who bears the same name.

This poem reminds me of our Jean Mary Lewis because of its vivid imagery of flowers and plants -- things that Jean loved very much.  It is also meaningful to me because Jean and Matt were regular guests at our annual Burns Night parties, held in late January, where everyone would eat haggis, drink Scotch, and read Burns and other poetry.  Jean was always a wonderful presence at Burns Night.

I feel so blessed for having had Jean in my life, as a close friend, over many years -- we had grown especially close in the months since last July.  Jean's love of life, her unending optimism, and her gentleness have taught me so much about love and life, as well as about pain and suffering.  Thank you, Jean, for being my dear friend.  May your graceful and loving spirit live on in all of our hearts forever.

And now, the Burns poem:

JEAN by Robert Burns (1759-1796)

Of a' the airts the wind can blaw,
I dearly like the west,
For there the bonnie lassie lives,
The lassie I lo'e best:
There wild woods grow, and rivers row,
And monie a hill between;
But day and night may fancy's flight
Is ever wi' my Jean.

I see her in the dewy flowers,
I see her sweet and fair:
I hear her in the tunefu' birds,
I hear her charm the air:
There's not a bonnie flower that springs
By fountain, shaw, or green;
There's not a bonnie bird that sings,
But minds me o' my Jean.

At the Oakland Museum, June 26, 2011

contemplating a whimsical kinetic sculpure

purporting to cure health problems by turning 

the handle 13 times on odd numbered days.

In a cornfield near Ann Arbor, October 2011

Pam Cory

For over 22 years, Jean was my friend, colleague, and mentor. She was one of those rare people who talked softly, but carried a big mind. There was no limit to her interests: she enjoyed Telemann and Buffy the Vampire Slayer; classic Russian literature, and Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. Jean had a wonderful sense of humor, delighting in the absurd and the campy. Her Halloween costumes were legendary: who can forget Jean as a Maypole, or the Pied Piper?

Jean exploring nature
from Oakmont album, circa 2010

But the one thing Jean was always rock-solid about was her dedication to crafting the perfect sentence. She would spend any amount of time getting just the right words. She also loved to do research. If someone asked her a question and she wasn’t sure of the answer, she would research the heck out of it! I think the Internet was invented specifically for her. And lest you think that editing is not a glamorous profession…Jean and I worked in Yosemite on the Yosemite Valley Plan. One holiday weekend, we had to work—as was often the case—so our families drove up to join us for the weekend. We all had brunch at the Ahwahnee, and afterwards, Jean and I went outside to the patio to continue our work. We felt we had arrived!

Another time, Jean and I were walking back to the office, and a homeless man sitting on the sidewalk yelled: “that man just took your wallet!” We lit out after the guy, and when he saw we were on to him, he tried to drop Jean’s wallet into a mailbox. We got him to stop, and he said he had “found it,” and was just trying to return it. Jean rewarded the man who tipped us off with a 20-dollar bill. Then, being an equal opportunity Good Samaritan, and despite all my advice to the contrary, she decided to give the thief a 20, just in case he really had been helpful, and not the bad guy!

Jean and I collaborated closely on countless projects, and while we didn’t finish each other’s sentences, we did rewrite them! Jean, you will be greatly missed, and always remembered!

At UCSF neuro-oncology, June 8, 2012, awaiting the results of

her latest MRI.  She looks so relaxed because we were  expecting good news. 

Jean  was coming from the Bear River writer's workshop, where she had 

made good progress on her novel/memoir.  But the MRI showed 

that the tumor had returned. 

At our polling place with a helpful neighbor Alessandro Latini,

November 6, 2011.  Alessandro drove us to the polls, and helped steady 

Jean on the walk to and from his car.  An ardent Obama

supporter, Jean was pleased by the election results.

New wheelchair ramp at 1853 Wood St, built

Saturday November 24, 2012.  Jean had been discharged 

the day before after being hospitalized

for brain swelling.  Design and labor by Ira Weise, 

Sherry Weise, and Marc Krizack.   

Phil Cushway

Phil read Dirge without Music by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.

So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:

Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned

With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.

Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.

Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.

A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,

A formula, a phrase remains, --- but the best is lost.

The answers quick & keen, the honest look, the laughter, the love,

They are gone. They have gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled

Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not approve.

More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the world.

Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave

Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;

Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.

I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.

Mary Ann Koory

Jean joined the first novel class I taught, almost exactly 4 years ago. It was a small class of rather flamboyant personalities. One was Joan (sitting there in the back) a former actress, a painter, a foodie, working on a spectacular urban fantasy novel– the youngest, Monica, an investment broker, remodeling her house with Japanese toilets and living in a Brazilian time zone while we met in Berkeley, she was writing a historical novel based on Herodotus – I remember some rather spectacular scenes involving crocodiles – Jon, a screen writer, recent fugitive from LA, tall, charming, high impact – and Kent who, somehow, not once in ten weeks, on the walk from his motorcycle to the building, during the elevator ride from the first to the 2^nd floor managed to get his motorcycle helmet and motocross jacket off before he walked into the classroom. Kent was always ready for the author portrait they take for the back cover. He looked dashing.

And finally there was Jean.

She rolled her wheelie pack in behind her, sat quietly, took notes, listened, and smiled; she encouraged everyone. She was always prepared with the assignment, but firmly believed that someone else’s was bound to be more interesting and ought to go first.

It was easy that first class to underestimate Jean. It might have taken me until the third class to stop underestimating her; I plead nerves, as that was my first novel class, but really there was little excuse.

Her comments were constructive, specific, often brilliant, in spite of their being offered diffidently. She was generous as a colleague to the other students, as Joan will attest; she was generous, too, as a student. I continue to use an excerpt of dialogue from Jane Austen that she found and the opening scene from a mystery novel set in 1930s San Francisco. That doesn’t even touch the range of her reading: She read all kinds of things, and appreciated them on their own terms.

That was how Jean was in class: unassuming but indelible.

I thought you might be interested in on how she was a writer, at least from my perspective.

Reading Jean’s work, at least in terms of style, was easy. Smooth and clear. No special effects, no hanging on to the last plot development like an ace up your sleeve; she trusted the reader and she cared a lot about telling the truth, fictionalized or no.

Reading her memoirs in terms of content was not easy. Most of the time I remember wishing it was fiction, but that was my reaction, not hers. She bore witness, without judgment, to the lives of the friends she loved. I think she felt that she had failed to save John and Sandra and that writing about their self-destruction might be a way to save what Jean loved about them, posthumously.

Or to use a different metaphor, in her memoir, she might cultivate their memory, like a beloved rare rose and let them grow again, and flourish, and be beautiful, again, without pain.

Her story was not an excuse for self-display: her descriptions were judicious, nuanced and occasionally really quite beautiful, just like Jean, but never because she was striving after that effect.

In one email she complained to me:

“when I am working on my own scenes I don't seem to be able to analyze what’s not working . . I find myself rewriting everything instead of being able to tweak it . . I remember that it’s what characters do that shows who they are, but I have trouble developing actions that build on or relate to each other. (My characters tend to just want to sit around and think look things up on the computer. It can be discouraging. Surely this reflects my overly sedentary life.)”

Her trouble was a complete commitment, in fairness and compassion, to every detail of the story she was writing: she couldn’t cut out details because her own mind had such a broad capacity for seeing the importance of every detail. This is a saintly philosophical Buddha-like position for a person in life – it is not, however, a particularly strategic way to write a story. Writers need to be ruthless.

One scene from the memoir she was writing about her friends Sandra and John stands out in this way.

Jean and Sandra wait on Sandra’s porch drinking gin and tonics waiting to hear confirmation of Sandra’s husband’s suicide. I don’t remember much of what they say or do; they are just waiting with a sense of inevitability. But I remember her description of the roses that grow around that porch.

I am not a gardener; in the usual way of things, I’d be more inclined to remember the gin and tonics. Jean’s intense appreciation for the blooms, their color, their size, how the vines grew, rendered them vividly for me.

The roses were alive and beautiful while the gardeners waited to hear terrible news about death and self-destruction. The roses were not waiting; they were living.

Jean the gardener, the steward of endangered roses and imperiled friends, Jean, the rememberer, the story-teller, the finder of the right words, the fixer of sentences, could offer no false comfort. She rendered those roses blooming around the porch. They were real, alive and a kind of grace for the women waiting there.

I want to share a passage from Annie Dillard, A Writer’s Life, a book I recommended to Jean at some point.

Dillard offers this instruction to writers. I think you can hear Jean’s method in it:

“Push it. Examine all things intensely and relentlessly. Probe and search each object in a piece of art. Do not leave it, do not course over it, as if it were understood, and instead follow it down until you see it in the mystery of its own specificity and strength . . . . Admire the world for never ending on you – as you would an opponent, without taking your eyes from him or walking away.”

Jean followed those instructions closely. She bore witness to her own life and her friends’ lives and her parents’ lives with intensity and admiration and did not flinch.

Dillard ends with an exhortation that I never heard Jean say in so many words but that I watched her live out, even as her family, her health and her work made heroic demands on her.

She kept writing.

She kept playing music.

She kept gardening.

She bore witness.

Her life says to us, keep looking at life closely, and see what the secrets of its beauty are; keep writing down each clue as you find it out; keep playing the tunes that you know and learn the reasons for the intervals and the flourishes.

I’d like to end with the rest of this passage from Dillard, an exhortation which today I hear in Jean’s gentle voice.

“One of the few things I know about writing is this: [writes Dillard] spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book, or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now. The impulse to save something good for a better place later is the signal to spend it now. Something more will arise for later, something better.”

At the Samovar Café, near the Zen Hospice, 

December 18 2012.  Jean rallied after arriving

 at the hospice, going on outings, editing documents,

and doing some writing.  With her at the Samovar

were  Sophie (volunteer),  Chris (fellow guest), and Matt. 

 , 

Texting at the Zen Hospice Christmas dinner,

December 25, 2012.  As Pam Cory pointed out 

in her eulogy, it seemed like the internet was made for 

Jean, and she enthusiastically adopted other 

technologies too.

Our cat Clark came to stay at the hospice on 

February 5, 2013.  Jean was always a great cat lover, 

and Clark was a great comfort to her over the

next two weeks.

Jean's ashes were interred February 25,
the day after the memorial