Everybody wants to go to heaven; but nobody wants to die.

Let's get one thing straight - parkinson's will not kill me. However, it is a serious disease and I deserve your sympathy - just not too much. I don't like Pollyanna sympathy and thankfully, I have yet to receive any. So let this put you on notice.

Two good reactions:

Before I describe G's reaction, I will let you in on our relationship. I have known G for 30 years. When I taught school, G's room was across the hall. G had a reputation of being a tough-as-nuts disciplinarian with a serious obsessive compulsive streak. However, I enjoyed her and she I. One day, just to mess with her, I drew a life sized portrait of G, wearing a toga. On the toga I wrote, "Honk if you want to seek Miss G in a toga". I put it on the wall outside of her room and at class change, her students went into her room honking like a gaggle of geese. G was stunned and decided her students each had an individual death wish. When she discovered the prank, she retaliated. I was teaching a class when she dashed into my room with an open, transparent umbrella, and a spray bottle full of water. She succeeded in chasing me from my room, a little damp from her attack. Of course my retaliation was called for..... and so it went for the next 7 years until I transferred.

But G and I remained friends, so when I told her of the news of my PD, her response was a genuine, "Aw Doug" and I could hear the caring in her voice before she switched over to humor. But those two words meant a lot to me and proved to me what I had always known. G is not as tough as she thinks she is (or was). Thanks G.

The second reaction I want to tell you about does not involve words. It is in the eyes of the recipient of the news. My older boy married a wonderful woman and together they produced two perfect boys. They live a block from us, so my wife and I walked over to deliver the news. I made sure the boys (4 and 2) were occupied elsewhere, and I told my son and daughter-in-law. The look in my daughter-in-laws eye's was full of empathy and understanding. She didn't need to say anything to me. I had already got the message.

These are just 2 of the reactions I appreciated. There were others, but these stand out.

Now I think I will go and read the Bible and try to find loopholes.