[DeTomaso] Where's my Profiles?.....

Sat Jan 23 15:29:07 EST 2010

Mike, many of us Know how sad and unfair cancer are!

Viggo and I are sending our condolences to you, your family, and the
family of your girlfriend.

Erik
Norway

2010/1/23, mannion.info <jim at mannion.info>:
> Mike
>
> First and foremost, my condolences to you and the family of your girlfriend.
> Those of us on the forum are old enough to have likely experienced the
> passing of a loved one or friend and hopefully we all have good support
> systems when the cycle of life become so very real. You have a masssive,
> albeit somewhat faceless, support system out here, and all of us owe you in
> one way or another for everything you've done for the Pantera community.
> Just know that the thoughts and prayers of this very unique community are
> with you as you make the adjustment to your life without someone you loved.
>
> Please let us know if there is some organization that will be named for
> contributions in her name.
>
> Jim Mannion
>
> pcar #5726
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <mikeldrew at aol.com>
> To: <detomaso at realbig.com>
> Sent: Saturday, January 23, 2010 12:50 PM
> Subject: [DeTomaso] Where's my Profiles?.....
>
>
>> ...a very valid question, that.
>>
>> Ever since I took over Profiles production back in 1995, I have been
>> behind
>> schedule, although usually it was rather consistently behind.   The last
>> issue of a given year would normally be printed in the first few months of
>>
>> the
>> next year.   2008 was no exception, as the 2008 No. 4 issue was printed in
>> February 2009.
>>
>> But things change for me as I started to put the 2009 No. 1 issue together
>> last year.   My girlfriend of some 13 years had been diagnosed with and
>> received a horrible surgery for a particularly nasty form of oral cancer.
>> Even
>> in the best case, we knew that she only had a limited time left, and were
>> determined to make the most of it.   She had a pretty good bucket list of
>> places she wanted to go and people she wanted to see, and I was determined
>>
>> to
>> let her achieve as many items on that list as possible.
>>
>> And so I found myself traveling to places and doing things that had
>> absolutely nothing to do with Panteras--a rather foreign concept to me.
>> We went
>> to New York for the US Open tennis tournament, we went to Denver to see
>> her
>> long lost brother, we went to Hawaii, both for the sake of going there and
>> also to see her best friend from college, etc. etc. etc.
>>
>> Finally, in the fall, she became too sick to travel any more, so she
>> stayed
>> at home.   Our trips then were confined to this doctor's office, or that
>> test, or an occasional sightseeing trip to Costco or Target.   Eventually
>> she
>> required hospitalization, on several occasions, for a week at a time; I
>> would get a cot and move into the hospital and stay with her the whole
>> time.
>>
>> Due to her condition, she was unable to speak after about October, so she
>> needed an advocate to advance her cause when she was in the hospital, and
>> ensure she received her medication in a timely fashion.   Her esophagus
>> had
>> completely closed off in February (almost a year ago now), so she was
>> unable to
>> swallow, meaning she had a feeding tube in her stomach, and all food and
>> medicine had to be administered in liquid form via large syringes.
>>
>> My work schedule was extremely flexible and I was able to scale back work
>> to a bare minimum, in order to allow me to spend more time with her,
>> helping
>> to care for her.   For the past few months she has been at home, suffering
>> mightily and bravely, requiring ever-increasing doses of pain medicine
>> just
>> to remain barely functional; I would typically spend half the week with
>> her,
>> and the other half at work.
>>
>> Generating Profiles is an extremely intensive process, one that requires
>> commitment and focus for many hours at a time, many days in a row.   I
>> found
>> that as much as I tried, I was unable to make much forward headway.   I
>> could
>> sit next to her in the hospital, or at her house, with my laptop on my lap
>> while she slept, and participate in this forum, because that was something
>> that just took a few minutes here and there.   It also provided an escape
>> from the horror that was unfolding before my eyes, as her condition
>> worsened
>> and new and horrible symptoms would crop up, one after the other.   (Her
>> latest symptom was to just continually bleed from her mouth, for hours at
>> a time,
>> requiring me to sit next to her as she slept and wipe the blood away every
>> 3-5 minutes without waking her--obviously that makes concentration on
>> producing a quality magazine an impossibility).
>>
>> But the circumstances of her condition, and of my life as a gypsy,
>> continually flitting back and forth between my home in Northern California
>>
>> and her
>> house in So-Cal, conspired to create what amounts to writer's block, I
>> think,
>> and the Profiles can kept getting kicked down the road, even as more
>> material would trickle in.
>>
>> I was literally packing my suitcase last night at midnight, to head down
>> there again this weekend, when I got a call from her sister--she had
>> suddenly
>> and unexpectedly died a few minutes earlier. :<(
>>
>> The general feeling had been that she was likely to make it through
>> January
>> and well into and perhaps through February.   I had cleared my work
>> schedule and had planned to spend much, if not all of February with
>> her--as much as
>> her time left would allow.   Nobody predicted that her condition would
>> suddenly turn for the worst, and by the time it had happened, it was too
>> late
>> for me to get to see her one last time.
>>
>> Now she's gone, and suddenly I'm faced with the prospect of once again
>> having considerable time available to me to devote to perpetuating the
>> club's
>> magazine.   I can't promise that I'll be particularly productive in the
>> next
>> few days, as there are arrangements to be made, services to be held etc.
>> But soon, before too long, I'll be back in the saddle with my spurs on and
>>
>> my
>> fingers will once again be flying on the keyboard.
>>
>> POCA members pay good money to be in the club and deserve to receive what
>> they've paid for, so my ambition is to knock out the 2009 issues in rather
>> quick succession and then get working on the first 2010 issue.   I'm
>> blessed
>> with a surfeit of material to get me started, but would still invite
>> contributions, as this material will be consumed by the semi-rapid
>> production rate
>> and the unusually high volume of magazines I hope to generate in a
>> relatively
>> short amount of time.
>>
>> Too, the vendors are on very rocky shoals, and have pulled in their
>> advertising budgets, so there will probably be fewer ads in the magazines,
>>
>> which
>> will make them slightly smaller in terms of page count as a result.   But
>> the
>> quantity and caliber of the content should remain unchanged--particularly
>> if
>> further contributions flow in, which I'm again asking for.
>>
>> Thanks to everyone for your patience and understanding during what had
>> been
>> the most trying time in my life.   I'm sorry I've been unable to fulfill
>> my
>> obligations to each of you in the past year, and I promise I'll do
>> everything in my power to make it up to you, as soon as I can.
>>
>> Mike
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