Calypso

It was the only piece of mail this past Saturday.  An unassuming 3 by 4 inch envelope addressed to Jill.  I didn’t recognize the name on the return address, I just figured it was part of the 2017 graduate thank you card parade that has been marching through our mailbox the past couple of months.  Turns out it wasn’t a graduation card, but rather a note stitching together the past and present.  I put the card on the kitchen counter where Jill could easily find it when she returned.

Later in the day I noticed the petite letter had been opened.  The card containing a kind note, thanking Jill for her donation and a picture of a young woman, who I didn’t recognize, in a cyclist outfit.  Jill then provided the back story. 

A few weeks back, Jill had been reading alumni news from her high school and noticed there was a story about a former Bishop Lynch student who was also a Texas Longhorn, both of Jill’s educational roots.  With that kind of fabric commonality she clicked on the link to the article thinking the young woman’s last name seemed familiar.  

She read the article about the woman joining the group of UT cyclists biking from Austin to Anchorage, the ‘Texas 4000, fighting cancer every mile’.  (http://www.texas4000.org/)  Then it hit Jill, the tie to this young woman.  The kind of realization that jolts your memories, feelings and emotions swirling together and heightening the attention, making you lean in to read the article closer.  She read further, the bio went on to explain that Madeline, the young woman, rides for her older sister Calypso, who she didn’t have chance to know.  She was a year old when Calypso passed away at the age of six. 

Jill said to me, “You remember the little…..” and before she could complete the sentence I responded, “I do”.  I had pieced things together and knew exactly where she was going with the story.

Jill was one of the many team members at Children’s Medical Center caring for Calypso and the family. 

The deeper tie to Jill and I is that it was in service for Calypso, while she was in the midst of her battle, that had Jill on the phone with Judith.  Judith, a Make-a-Wish director, and mother of an old friend of mine from high school.  Judith had just recently moved from Pittsburgh to Dallas.  They were patching together activities around Calypso’s wish.  During the call Jill liked Judith so much that she asked if she had a son she could marry.  Judith’s response was, her sons were married, but his son’s friend needs a wife and he lives in Dallas.  To which Jill replied, ‘If he is tall, nice and Catholic give him my number.’  Fortunately for me, Jill was a little older by this time and had excluded other criteria for a mate that would have eliminated me from further consideration. 

It was Calypso who was the initial stitch that led to Jill and I being tied together.  All these years later, on an otherwise standard Saturday afternoon a card arrived in our mailbox from her grown sister keeping her memory alive. 

You just never know how things will unfold and the impact one person, even a six year old, has on those that she may not even know, but are fortunate enough to be within her ecosystem.  I keenly remember the day that Calypso passed away.  I had just reached my desk at work when the phone rang.  It was Jill and it was terribly difficult to understand her.  I just listened.  I had no other concept of how to deal with such overwhelming raw emotions or how to provide support over the phone.  Jill ended the call with, “I want to bake cookies for a living, no one dies baking cookies.”

Please consider expanding your ecosystem by supporting Madeline in her efforts to honor her big sister.   http://www.texas4000.org/rider/2018/unassigned/madeline-schill/