After 32 days in the hospital, Julie Barber is preparing to leave a place that has become like home. Our 16-year-old daughter has had two surgeries to remove a rare, grade 2 astrocytoma from her spinal cord that has left her paralyzed from the waist down.
It’s difficult to put into words just how amazing this experience has been for my daughter and our whole family. While this is not a situation I would wish on anyone, it’s where we are and it has changed our lives in unimaginable ways.
When we found out that Julie needed to have this tumor removed, we did what any parent would do. We started to research. We needed to know if there was anywhere else in the country that we should bring Julie to have this delicate surgery done. I’m thrilled to report that we truly do have the best of the best right here at DHMC.
Dr. David Bauer gives surgeons a good name. Beyond being an exceptional surgeon, he is truly one of the kindest human beings we have ever met.
Our feelings of love and gratitude for the outstanding staff here at DHMC is something very difficult to explain. The time we have spent here with these amazing people has been life-changing in so many positive ways. Without exception, every person we have spent time with has made us feel like we have a family who truly cares for us. It will be extremely difficult to leave them when we head to Boston for further care.
Julie and our entire family have been blessed beyond words by the kindness and generosity of friends we know and many more new friends we’ve yet to meet. Julie’s strength and determination are going to get her through this life-changing experience. It is life changing but not life threatening. Julie’s positive attitude will help her in countless ways, but the strength she has gained by the outpouring of support from this amazing community, and far beyond, has touched her (and the whole family) profoundly. We will be forever grateful.
Tom and Kate Barber Cornish
So, What’s the Solution?
Columnist Jim Kenyon (“No Room for the Homeless,” Dec. 18) is quick with criticism of the Lebanon City Council in its attempts to humanely handle the homeless people problem within its borders. One can, in most cases, have compassion for those reduced to that condition in life.
But did you notice that Kenyon did not present a solution of his own? Why not? One cannot help but wonder what Kenyon would write and do if the homeless were to take up residence in his affluent hometown of Norwich. It is strange what our reactions are when a problem is not in our backyard.
I believe that Kenyon also commented on the panhandlers on 12A, of which there would be none if motorists did not stop and give them money. In which case, the panhandler would take his or her dog and return to the car and drive away, hopefully to find a job that will give Social Security at retirement age, which panhandling will never provide. That would remove another homeless or penniless person to be provided for.
Gordon StoneWest Lebanon
Proud of Dartmouth Basketball
In his Dec. 18 article “Waiting Game Continues,” Sportswriter Tris Wykes asks readers what we make of the request by Dartmouth women’s basketball coach Belle Koclanes to understand that it takes a process to get more wins. Here’s what this reader makes of it: Koclanes is absolutely right! She is a great coach, educator and leader of young women.
In turn, I have two questions for Wykes. First, do you actually know how hard it is to win a Division I basketball game? If you did, as many of your knowledgeable readers do, you wouldn’t have been so sarcastic in your article. You are not writing for a Hearst publication. Your readers want analysis, not attitude. Koclanes is doing a good job. Her players play hard, pull together and bond as a close-knit community. It makes this Dartmouth graduate proud of the women’s program.
Neil Castaldo Hanover
Dartmouth Has Alternatives
On Dec. 13, the Planning Board voted 4 to 1 to deny Dartmouth’s site plan application for an indoor practice facility primarily intended to protect its athletes from winter weather. Board members did so because they determined that the 70,000-square-foot, 68-foot-high, warehouse-style building, looming over that residential neighborhood, with frontage on Tyler Road, did not comply with the town’s site plan regulations for the proposed location.
Since the Planning Board’s decision, there have been two articles in the Valley News describing Dartmouth leaders’ disappointment over college students having to play in cold or wet weather when there is not enough room in Leverone Fieldhouse for all of that day’s scheduled practices. They did not mention the harm to quality of life and property values the adjoining residential neighborhood would have incurred so that students could have an indoor practice facility in the proposed location.
Dartmouth can spend its allocated $17.5 million for an indoor practice facility by locating it elsewhere, such as on the grass fields known as Blackman Fields on Chase Field, or installing a seasonal bubble over Memorial Field, both of which are within walking distance of campus but are not shoe-horned in against a residential neighborhood.
As has been suggested by many over the years, Dartmouth could develop some of its 95 acres on Route 10 for sports facilities, only 1 mile from campus. The proposed indoor practice building could be tucked into that 95-acre parcel so that its massive proportions wouldn’t be visible from Lyme Road.
Nina LloydHanover
A Brief Christmas Memory
I have only one childhood memory of Christmas. I was 5 or 6 (1944-1945). It was Christmas Eve. My parents and my brother were sitting in the living room of the building I would call home for over 68 years. It was silent.
We were gazing at the beauty of our Christmas tree — the only illumination in the house. My father stood up and slowly removed a small package from his jacket pocket. It contained four individually wrapped chocolate-covered cherries, a treat I’d never tasted. He gave one to each of us and instructed that we not bite into them until the chocolate had melted. The event lasted only a couple of seconds, but it has stayed with me.
Roger SmallClaremont