THE BELL CURVE
joseph n. bell
For the past three weeks, my stepson’s 1985 Mercury Topaz has been parked
in front of our house, a derelict piece of flotsamadrift in a sea of
newer and far less battered vehicles. My stepson, in his last year at
Occidental College, is now in a more dependable car at the insistence of
his mother, who nightly pictured him stalled in some desperate section of
Los Angeles. And I’ve been driving the Topaz -- feeling rather like I did
with my first Model-A Ford -- while we decided how to dispose of it.
This has not been altogether comfortable for me. My Great Depression
mentality says that if a car is still running, it should be kept and
driven. And further that the older the car, the younger the driver should
be. When I knew that I had lost both contests, I began looking about for
the best way to resolve this matter. Should I try to sell this potential
problem to some unsuspecting soul or seek another means of getting it out
of my life short of driving it off the Newport Pier?
I was still searching for an answer to this question when I heard about
James Sanchez, who is 8 years old and the grandson of my friends and
neighbors, Pat and Jim Altobelli. James’ parents, who live in Buena Park,
discovered a lump in their son’s rib cage eight months ago. They were
concerned but not alarmed when their family doctor said he would keep an
eye on it. But the lump grew bigger and bigger and finally became painful
enough that the doctor decided it should be removed. A biopsy beforehand
discovered that James was afflicted with Ewing’s Sarcoma -- a bone cancer
found primarily in children.
All this happened a few weeks before Christmas. James had just completed
three days of chemotherapy when he was allowed to go home to share
Christmas with his twin sister, Jennifer, and hisparents. It was not the
best holiday for the Altobelli clan, which now numbers 14 grandchildren.
When James returned for further treatment at Children’s Hospital of
Orange County, he had some unexpected visitors. They came from the
Make-A-Wish Foundation, and his grandmother says today that the news
forced her to gulp since the Foundation mostly rings its special brand of
joy to terminally ill children.
But James was delighted to see them because he had an immediate answer
when his visitors asked him if he had one wish, what would it be? James
wanted to go to outer space. His mother was surprised because she thought
this pragmatic youngster would choose something more immediately
achievable -- a trip to Disney World, perhaps. But James knew what he
wanted and didn’t waffle. And if the Make-A-Wish people were stumped,
they didn’t show it. They just told James they would see what they could
do about getting him up there.
Meanwhile, James had a dozen rounds of chemotherapy before hewas
pronounced ready for surgery. By that time, the tumor had been reduced
from -- said his mother -- “a cantaloupe to a tootsie roll.” Still there
were some disturbing signs left, and so James was put on a program of
radiation -- and that’s when Make-A-Wish fired up the rocket.
He came home one day from a treatment to find a limousine parked in front
of his house. It carried James and his mother to Boeing’s Reusable Space
Systems facility in Downey, the home of the space shuttle. He was greeted
there by a banner that proclaimed: “Welcome James, Astronaut To Be.”
Boeing’s Space Flight Awareness director and her crew took over then to
prepare James for his venture into space. An afternoon of touring ended
with James piloting a space simulator, followed by a phone conversation
with astronaut Joe Tanner, a veteran of two space walks, speaking from
the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.
Proudly wearing his space hat, James headed home with a bagfulof
souvenirs and a head full of star dust. The limousine drivertold James’
mother that he had driven dozens of famous people over the years, but he
had never had a better day than this one. James also managed to give the
space program a few anxious hours. Shortly after he got home, his mother
received a panicked call that some important papers had come up missing.
Could James possibly have them? He did. He had added the papers to his
bag of souvenirs.
Neither Boeing nor Make-A-Wish stopped with that first visit. A Boeing
vice president personally delivered an album of pictures to James’ home,
and his Boeing friends called almost daily to find out how he was doing.
Then, two weeks after his original venture into space, James was again
driven to the Space Center, this time to listen to the preparations for a
launch and finally to give it his blessing. The blast-off didn’t take
place until James said it was a “Go.”
When I heard this story, I had my answer. I went home and offered the
Topaz to Make-A-Wish. A few days later, I met James at a party at his
grandparent’s house, his glistening shaved head bobbing up and down as he
raced around with his cousins.
James has just set out on a new round of chemotherapy that the doctors
hope will have his cancer in remission by Christmas. And as I watched
the Topaz disappear up the street, I wished fervently that it might play
a small part in helping that to come about.
* JOSEPH N. BELL is a Santa Ana Heights resident. His column appears
Thursdays.
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