1960

Medical treatments have grown, in many cases, so sophisticated as to afford hope even to the very seriously ill, as recent examples in our class show. Their rays of optimism brighten us all.

Dick Davidson, battling a recurrence of cancer, completed in mid-April two and a half weeks of intensive radiation following lymph node surgery, and his wife, Arlene, tells us, "was pronounced sufficiently healed to begin his yearlong course of Alpha Interferon. He has now had three treatments with extremely mild side effects." Dick himself, in a speech marking the 50th anniversary of his bar mitzvah, observed, "I have been exposed to enough rads to power a nuclear submarine halfway around the world. I glow in the dark....While I may not be the ideal prospect for a life insurance policy, I am not afraid to buy green bananas. I beat it before, and I'll beat it again."

Dick Chase, meanwhile, is upbeat despite having to give up piloting his own plane because of heart problems that have brought worsening atrial fibrillation during the last decade and then arterial blockages one and a half years ago that led to two angioplasties and implantation of stents. A branch artery remains blocked and he can feel the pressure "upon exertion." "Basically, I can do 90 or 95 percent of what I could do before," he remarks. "It's something I am viewing I can live with very well. I work out in a gym three times a week. I have a weight program and do aerobic exercises. They want me to exercise and be active."

Chuck Kaufman was one of the outstanding athletes in our class, and his heart attack in 2000 took a toll, both physically and emotionally. Since his father died comparatively young (when Chuck was only a sophomore), after Chuck underwent a single bypass, his doctor came out and talked to his three children about risk factors they should be aware of for themselves.

"The thing that stunned me was the emotions of all this," Chuck says. "I had read it and heard it and the doctor had warned me, but still, I'd be watching a golf tournament and all of a sudden tears would be coming. I wasn't prepared. But now I'm feeling pretty good. It took five or six months, but I'm back working out three times a week."

There are, sadly, few rays of optimism with Don Weitzman. But his wife, Harriet, says, "Every once in a while you still see the little spark" of the brilliant trial attorney he used to be, before he was struck at age 58 with the little-known Lewy body dementia, a variation of Alzheimer's and Parkinson's that hits younger than anyone expects.

Harriet is particularly grateful to Alan Friedman for his visits.Today, she says of Don, "he kind of talks in numbers. That's most of his vocabulary. We're forever playing around with his medications. He sleeps a lot. He doesn't focus." There are still the other moments, she says, "but the last year has been really hard."

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