Persistence Pays: a Myth Uncovered

Kalaupapa in 1890,  about the time my family lived there.
(photo from http://superpupsays.typepad.com/
superpup_says/2010/10/castaways.html
Oct 2010)

A long-held story in my mother's family is that her great-grandmother died a Kalaupapa, the leper colony on the island of Moloka'i where  St. Damien, then Fr. Damien, served as priest.  There are a variety of ancillary stories -- how she really didn't have leprosy, how there was some jealousy in the community over her reputed beauty, how her husband and two sons went with her as kokua (care-givers), how she was actually sent to the colony but refused to leave when it was determined she was not a leper because she could not take her trunk of beautiful dresses (holoku) with her back to Maui.

PROBLEM:  There are no records of Hele'ualani at Kalaupapa.  No record of diagnosis.  No record of admission as a patient.   No record of housing.  No census entry.  Nothing.  There are multiple records for her husband and two sons -- admission as patients at the Kalihi Detention Center in Honolulu, transfer to Kalaupapa, church records in Kalaupapa, and records of their deaths in the register of the colony residents.  A cousin and I began to wonder if she ever was there.  We looked further.

This morning I found a computerized entry for a woman named Heleualani among a collection of Hawaiian Deaths and Burials.  This woman was born about 1846, and died at Kaaluloa (sic) on 6 Apr 1886.  She fits the expected profile, more or less, for my great-great-grandmother.  The computerized version of this record does not tell which island Kaaluloa is on, nor does it tell whether Hele'ualani is buried on private land or in a cemetery.  The gazetteers were useless.  The place may no longer exist.  It may be too small to count.  It may be misspelled. It just doesn't appear.  Anywhere.

The online transcription does not tell us anything else about Heleualani to help identify her as our ancestor.  I gave a copy of the print-out to my cousin to mull over.

A couple of hours later he called back.  "Could that place be Kaululoa?" he asked.  I'll know on Saturday when I can get down to the local LDS facility and read the microfilm.

"Read the land records you already have  Hele'ualani and Kaho'oilimoku sold just under 6 acres of land to Dennis Toomey in 1885.  Where was it?"  Toomey had fathered two of this couple's grandchildren, and was then living with their daughter.  I found the deed he mentioned.  The parcel was identified as being in Kaululoa, Kawaipapa, Hana.  Where we know Hele'ualani and her husband Kaho'oilimoku lived.

The source for the burial record is a register of burials from the Kingdom of Hawaii.  If this particular register is from the Hana district of Maui, we have found what happened to our great-great-grandmother.  She may or may not have had leprosy.   My guess is that she did, since her husband and two youngest children were known leprosy patients.  But she died, at home, in Hana, before she could be sent to Moloka'i.

Another myth created in family tradition may be shattered.  A transcription error may be overcome.  It helps to have someone with whom to bounce around ideas.  Thank you, Tim, for being that person.

Masterful Understatement

I took my mother to see an orthopedic surgeon yesterday.  

In January 2011 she started some serious complaining about pain.  First there was the gout -- in her toe, later in her thumb.  Now she takes a daily anti-gout pill.  Then there was the shoulder pain that had her right arm in a sling for about 3 days -- until it was too much trouble to keep it in the sling.  She had been complaining to her primary care physician for at least a year before that about her shoulder bothering her.  She is correct when she says he doesn't really listen to how she feels about things, just passes her complaints off as the normal process of aging.

At her January 2012 quarterly visit with the PCP, she was offered an x-ray and a visit to the orthopedist.  She declined, complaining, "Can't you just give me a shot and make it go away?"

By last week, she was no longer sleeping because the pain was keeping her awake at night.  After another visit to the PCP, she agreed to shoulder x-rays.  Initial diagnosis?  Worn out shoulder joint with rough places, bone spurs in the space where the shoulder and scapula meet, and possible rotator cuff damage.

The orthopedist took one look at the x-rays yesterday, blew by the worn out joint and bone spurs, and focused directly on that rotator cuff.  "No question." he told his nurse.  "That rotator cuff is completely separated from the bone."  Patiently, he explained her options to my mother.  1) Live with it.  2) Get a cortisone shot that might reduce the symptoms, typically for about 4  months, then repeating the shots as necessary.  3) Surgery to smooth out the rough places on the bone that are rubbing together and causing the pain.

My mom elected not to have surgery, but admitted that the pain is more than she is willing to continiue to endure.  That left the shot option.  With a little help from her daily doses of  ibuprofen, today the pain is down to an acceptable level.

Here's the kicker.  Before seeing the orthopedist, she had to fill out a basic new patient form.  Do you have pain? Yes.  Is it mild, moderate or severe?  Mild.  On a scale of  0 to 10 where 0 is no pain and 10 is the most you can stand, what is your pain level?  9.  I warned the receptionist.  "This lady won't complain.  The fact that she is here says the pain is more than she can tolerate.  Keep that in mind when she describes it as mild."    They smiled and said they'd bring that to the doctor's attention.

Give thanks for competent doctors who take the time to explain to each patient all their options and the consequences of each, then accept the patient's decision for treatment.
Don't forget to pray!

Back to School

Have I written about the new computer?  

I was going to buy myself something with a 21-23" monitor, preferably one of the new all-in-one units so I wouldn't have to figure out a place for the tower.    Then my brother offered me an Apple laptop.  I countered with the 21" iMac.  With a TB of memory.  With all the software to allow it to do everything I need.  And a maintenance contract.  And the Apple service called One-to-One, individual training to use your computer effectively.  He agreed.

The good news is that the Apple Store is only a half-mile from the house.  The bad news is that a 21" all-in-one is a substantial beast to haul around.  Even if the store is only 1/2 mile away, there's still the walk through the mall.  With the iMac.  Which  now has its very own hand truck (folding, from Costco) and a luggage strap (leftover from real luggage) to keep the box and hand truck from parting company in transit.

The good news is that the One-to-One training is helpful.  As long as you are using an Apple product.  Third party vendor?  No support -- unless from the vendor.  Even if you buy the product in an Apple store.  I suppose that's reasonable.  But it can be frustrating.

So the iMac and I go off to school about once each week.  We're learning.  Sometimes quickly.  We learned about a new product, iCloud, in about 10 minutes.   Desktop Publishing is going slowly.  Just needs practice.  Lots of practice.  So much to learn, and so little time.

Pray for patience.  Your own patience in a challenging situation.   My patience with the iMac!

* * * * * 

To my online friends

If you've been following this blog, or following my posts on Facebook, you don't need another summary of the year.  You know it has been long, and busy, with some highs and some lows.  You know that I sometimes struggle to focus on the positives.    Most of the time I am successful.

Some of you have had more than your share of difficulties this year.   Several of you have lost a  beloved life partner, a parent or grandparent.  Some of you have children whose ideas of sharing the holidays is different from yours.  Some of you are hard hit by the state of the economy.  Some of you are away from home, from the familiar, from those you love.  It's a hard time of year to be alone.  An yes, it is all too possible to be alone in a crowd.

Some of you are celebrating -- new paths, new perspectives, new views, new relationships.

Some of you celebrate other winter holidays at this darkest time of the year.  Significantly, all those seasonal holidays speak of the contrast between the present darkness and the promise of light to come.  My personal choice is the Christian version of this darkness/light celebration, the season of Advent culimating in Christmas, the celebration of Christ's birth.   Intellectually, we know shepherds are not in the fields of the Middle East in December.  But the Advent Wreath, like the Menorah, begins with a single candle, only to glow with its brightest promise of hope and  light at the end of the season, in the very darkest days of winter.  The sun rising on the day of the Winter Solstice finds the keystone in circles of standing stones like Stonehenge or Calanish.   Light will follow, literally and figuratively.  Whatever our belief, the promise is  there. 

Keep your faith.
Look to the light.
Merry Christmas!
Don't forget to pray.......

It Came Upon a Midnight Clear

When the current version of the Episcopal hymnal was about to be published, our Bishop called all lay leaders to his annual Labor Day Weekend conference -- Friday dinner through Sunday lunch.  We moaned every year about giving up the entire holiday weekend, but always came away enriched with lessons that would stick in our minds and hearts.  That year the workshop leader was a member of the Commission which selected what would be included in and what would be omitted from the new hymnal. 

Dr. Mealy pointed out that most renditions of this particular hymn omit the 3rd verse -- and called it to our attention.  This is NOT a pretty little piece of musical fluff.   It is a dramatic challenge to our Christian faith, a call to action, a piece of protest music.  My politically liberal soul can still see this mild little man in that rural mountain chapel, reading these words in his powerful voice, then over the next hour leading us through the two hymn tunes and suggesting how each melody sets a different mood, carries the message in a different way.  "Use all the verses." he told us.  "Always."

Here are verses 3 and 4.   Read it as poetry.  Then sing it, aloud or in your mind.  What do you hear?

           Yet with the woes of sin and strife the world has suffered long,
           beneath the heavenly hymn have rolled two thousand years of wrong;
           and warring humankind hears not the tidings which they bring. 
          O hush the noise and cease your strife and hear the angels sing!


          For lo! the days are hastening on, by prophets seen of old,
          when with the ever-circling years shall come the time foretold
          when peace shall over all the earth its ancient splendors fling
          and all the world give back the song which now the angels sing.
                                                                    [Edmund Hamilton Sears (1810-1876)]

Hush the noise.  Cease the strife.  Hear the song of the angels.  Give back the song....


May your Christmas be blessed. 

* * * * *

Back to Writing

No, my world is not falling apart, although for the past 2 weeks I haven't been very confident of that.

My mother caught a bug, then had the audacity to share it.  SHE went immediately onto an antibiotic and promptly recovered.  Not being 97 years old or sharing her risk factors, I didn't get the antibiotic.  Short version:  5 days into the second week of near-immobility, I picked up remaining antibiotics from my mom's prescription.  Life has improved dramatically.

Then there's the absent computer.  It didn't die, just went off to be copied.  Now it is back at home, along with a new sibling,  The sibling is going to make life lots harder for a while, but just may turn out to be a joy in the long run.  I've been considering a larger monitor (20" or greater) for several months.  Looked at the HP all-in-one units, but ended up with the iMac version.

To understand the magnitude of this decision, consider that I learned to use a computer some 36 years ago, in the days when the word processor of choice, developed at Stanford University, was called Wilbur.  Wilbur had a brother, Orville.  As in the WRITE brothers .....   Wilbur ran on a stand-alone device that sat behind my desk and adjacent to the IBM Selectric typewriter.  We sent off multiple reels of 1" magnetic tape at the end of each business day, all the way from California to Missouri or Oklahoma where they were stored for safe-keeping.   It was the industrial standard for secure backups.  Upstairs in our building they were still using data entry keypunch operations -- in a state-of-the-art scientific research facility. 

Four years later, with a different employer, with the encouragement of an in-house engineer, the two of us brought desktop computers to our remote worksite.  The PCs came along a couple of years later.  About that same time, we spent a few months with an Apple Macintosh resident in a spare bedroom at home.  But the Mac returned to its own home, and I have been a dedicated PC user ever since.  Even stood between the IT folk and the line supervisors at work, helping supervisors learn to use the computers they were REQUIRED to use in their revised job assignments, leaving the IT folk free to do more complex IT tasks.  I don't claim to be a techie, but am quite comfortable troubleshooting and maintaining at least my own PC software.

This iMac is as different animal altogether.  I love the 21.5" monitor.  I love the color quality and imaging I'm seeing, even in the first few hours of ownership. I am looking forward to mastering the stylus tablet that we purchased in lieu of the Mac touchpad.  The graphics stuff that comes with this unit is amazing.  But -- it took several hours  to discover the equivalent of "My Computer".  The mouse works differently.  What happened to all those "right click" tasks?  My friend who said, "You're going to miss the things you control yourself in Windows, but cannot control in the Apple world," was correct.  That may change ..... 

The ads tell you that it is simple to run Windows on a new Mac system.  What they don't tell you is that getting from here to there (adding a Windows component to your Mac system) is NOT supported by Apple.  If I can do it on Apple, I'm perfectly happy to; if I cannot, I'd appreciate some help with the set-up side of that transition.  Apple says, "It's not our product, we don't support it."  Microsoft says, "Switching to a competitor?  Not our problem."  So there's a learning curve here that is going to bring some frustration until I build the techie knowledge essential to  running my Windows-based genealogy software on my new, flashy iMac.  Cannot switch to a Mac-compatible product; there is just no equivalent in the genealogical community.  Even Family Tree Maker, which has a Mac version, lacks much of the advanced capability provided by The Master Genealogist. 

Remember that little graphic of the two buzzards on a tree limb, one saying to the other, "Patience my ..., I'm gonna' kill somebody!"?  Pray that I can get beyond that response to focus on finding answers!   Meanwhile, give thanks for new toys and new things to learn.

Don't forget to pray!

*****

November.
Clocks change.  Except in Arizona and Hawaii.
In those parts of the world where there is real winter, leaves are changing -- or have changed and fallen.
In Honolulu, the solar clothes dryer is once more unpredictable, with rains lurking in the valleys.  It's important to get the laundry in as soon as it is dry rather than when it is convenient.

Writing and research are taking a back seat to the crafty things involved in holiday giving, and in baking for our church Holiday Sale next weekend.

Very large funeral today for a dear lady and quilter who was active in 3 of the 4 Royal Societies, Daughters of Hawaii, and a bunch more organizations.  It took a good 30 minutes for each of the Royal Societies to honor Auntie Rose, preceded by another 20 minutes of eulogies.  All that before the traditional Episcopal Requiem Mass.  She was a  vibrant lady, even at the very end of her life when I met her.  Here's an article from 2009 that focuses on her exuberant style, as well as a much longer montage of photos posted at YouTube.  Auntie Rose was definitely one of a kind.

Had lunch a week ago with a former co-worker and his wife.  So very nice to see them again -- hard to realize that it has been as long as it has.  She -- the wife -- lived here for a number of years, but has also lived in CA for a long time.  We did a very local thing and had lunch at the cafe at the Honolulu Academy of Arts.  It was enough of a treat that we even tempted my mother to join us.  She was pleased to be included.

My walking partners are in travel mode.  R is due home this month after 2 months in Chicago.  B is just back from a week in Hong Kong, and is currently on a weekend junket to Las Vegas.  Building air miles, she says, in  preparation for her husband's retirement.

Give thanks for friends, both new and old, and the opportunity to share time together.
Don't forget to pray!