What It Takes (127 page)

O God, give us serenity to accept what cannot be changed, courage to change what should be changed, and wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.

Which was this?

Dick’s faith was Loreen’s. He knew this was God’s will, but that would not stop his striving. When you accept God’s will, when you give yourself into His hands, then He will help you work your will ... that was Loreen’s way. Praise the Lord ... and pass the ammunition.

Matt’s lungs cleared. The treatments resumed. But the doctors were juggling drugs. The surgeons thought they should go in to remove his bladder and bowel. The radiation specialists recommended starting with radiation. The chemotherapy doctors recommended chemotherapy first. Dick and Jane learned more medicine than they ever knew existed ... and they learned: the doctors did not know. They didn’t have the answer! Everybody said something different! That’s when Dick and Jane started managing their own case.

Jane read everything she could get. The Gephardts traveled to specialists in Chicago and Philadelphia ... they were on the phone twenty times to Texas. They looked into the Mexican Apricot Pit cure ... the claims of miraculous recovery. There was one poor woman who called their house, several times, trying to get them to take Matt to Mexico—and take her along ... she needed a cure, too. There wasn’t anything that was too strange, no odds too wide, at least to check out. Loreen sent the three of them—Dick, Jane, and Matt—to a service in Pittsburgh by the Pentecostal faith healer, Kathryn Kuhlman.

And, meanwhile, day to day, week to week, there was the narrow, endless round in St. Louis: their house on Fairview (a couple of neighbors were permitted to visit), and Lou and Loreen’s on Morganford (Dick’s folks were on constant call, baby-sitting, cooking, yard work at Dick and Jane’s). Brother Don and his wife, Nancy, came back to St. Louis that summer, for Don’s doctorate at Washington U, so their home, too, fell within the straitened circle. But those were the only places, and people, in Jane and Matt’s life ... and, of course, the doctors, at Barnes Hospital. Back and forth to the hospital ... Jane could do the route in her sleep. Once a week, twice a week, every day ... back and forth. She’d take Matt for treatment in the morning, then they’d stop on the way home—White Castle belly-bombers ... but Jane would eat in the car. She couldn’t take Matt into a restaurant. ... She’d get him home, try to put him to sleep—it was a blessing, when he could sleep ... and she’d tiptoe back to his room, after he’d drifted off, and lay her hand on him, below his tummy, to feel ... she couldn’t
not
feel him:

Was it smaller?

She’d ask the doctors, over and over:

Was it shrinking? ... At
all
? ... Was it ...

No.

Dick would rush home to be with Matt. Maybe he’d have to go out again, for an evening meeting ... but, meanwhile, the time was precious—could be gone, like
that
. ... Dick would strip off his suit coat and call, “Hey, Bugs!” (Dick had nicknames for everyone.) “Wanna ride?” ... Then he’d pull Matt, in his little red wagon, everywhere he went.

The wagon was a near constant—or the stroller. There were times when Matt was too weak to get around any other way. If he felt stronger, if he could walk, and play, Dick would organize “orchestra.” That was a game where everybody got an instrument—clappers, castanets, kazoo, bell, whistle ... and they’d march around the house—Dick, Jane, Lou, Loreen ... and tiny, bald Matt in the lead, as the grand maestro.

Sometimes Dick would go along to the hospital, to talk with the doctors. He could not understand why the surgeon said something different from the radiotherapist, the oncologists—they were different departments, sure, but they were supposed to work on Matt’s case together ... so he’d get them together. He’d talk to them all, he’d ask each in turn—what did they want to do? ... And he’d listen to the positions—where’s the bottom line? He’d tell each what the others said. ... And in time, they had a treatment plan, Matt’s team of doctors was a team. New drugs? Step up the radiation? They’d talk it out. The bridge was Dick Gephardt.

Of course, the expense was ferocious. Dick and Jane were hardly wealthy. Thompson and Mitchell had the compassion to hunt up a new medical plan, something to cover catastrophic care. They gave the assignment to Gephardt. And Dick worked it out: he read up on insurance, he talked to salesmen, to the hospital ... he built the law firm a new health plan. Then he sold it, in-house, first to the senior partners, and then to the others—down to the last associate, they signed on—and Dick had his coverage (though the young associates were shocked to learn they’d signed away maternity coverage in the deal).

He was learning health care as he learned everything: you’d tell him something, and he had it forever ... and not just Matt’s case. What he learned was the
system
. He could talk about doctors, the equipment, treatments, insurance, the hospital, its costs. ... Within a year, he was president of CURE, the organization of parents whose children had cancer. Within two years, he was appointed to the board of Barnes Hospital (and soon thereafter proved his worth in the system by casting the deciding vote on the Board of Aldermen to permit the hospital’s expansion).

But that was just Dick’s way of doing
everything
... what it all came back to, that autumn, was Matt.

The treatment ground on. It was months since the diagnosis, and Matt held on ... though no one could say they were winning.

Till one day, Jane tiptoed up to his room, and felt his belly, and ...
she couldn’t feel it!
She felt and felt.
She could not feel it!

Could that be?

Was that possible?

Even the
doctors
couldn’t feel it. They took X-rays. ... And the massive tumor was gone—shriveled to a tiny lump inside.

“Rare ...” they said. “Must have been shrinking for some time ... very strange ...”

Jane said: “Well, if you believe in miracles ...”

It was winter when they wheeled Matt in, and they cut out the tumor, the wizened lump—they got it all. The cancer had spread to his bladder, his prostate, so the surgeons had to remove them, along with part of his bowel.

“There may be problems,” the doctors told Dick and Jane. Treatment would have to continue. If one cell was left, the cancer could come back ...

“For how long?” Dick asked. “How long before you
know
?”

“Well, years ...” What they meant was, forever.

But treatment for the first two years ... and after that, if nothing happened ... well, the chances were better.

“And after that?”

“Well, the first ten years ...”

Ten years!

It seemed like a lifetime away, to Dick and Jane—another lifetime.
Any
years were a gift—they were bonus years!

Matt was in the hospital after the surgery. The healing was painful, the damage immense. New tubes and bags ... it would be difficult for him—difficult, now, for Dick and Jane ... but Matt was
there
... and he grew stronger. At last, they brought him home.

Matt moved slowly through the rooms, looking at everything in its turn, as if he had to check it against his inventory. ... And then, he looked up at his parents, at Lou and Loreen, standing by ... and demanded:

“Orchestra!”

And he marched them around the house.

D
ICK WAS IN IOWA
, the following weekend, when he got his reprieve. Michael Duffy, from
Time
magazine, told him:
Time
had the story—it would come out Monday—it was the Dukakis campaign that put the hit on Biden.

Thank you, Jesus!

Gephardt had a brutal schedule, crisscrossing the state—west to east, corner to corner ... followed by a few hours’ sleep at his mother’s apartment. Loreen had decided to stay in Des Moines—the Lord had work for her. (It occurred to her that the birthday of Lou, her late husband, was ...
February Eighth
—the night of the Iowa caucus! ... “And did I tell you? The last four numbers of my Social Security card? ...
1988
!”) And Dick had decided—one look at his budget had decided
him
—there was no use spending money on a hotel when Loreen had a perfectly good foldout couch.

Sixteen hours of work, six towns, five hundred miles ... to a foldout couch?

“No, it’s greeeaat!”

See, it didn’t matter what he had to do. Didn’t matter that his message cops came to poke him after every speech. (“Dick, your first piece, up front, is that you’re gonna win ... so your close has got to be, ‘
I want you on board, NOW!
’ ... see? And it’s, ‘
When ... WHEN I’m elected, I will not forget
...’ ”)

Didn’t matter that the Japanese Trade Ministry had an operative dogging Gephardt’s steps. For God’s sake, they got her on his plane! ... She was an American, small and serious, who kept asking Dick to
explain
what was unfair about Japan. (“Congressman, could we go into the beef situation?”)

Didn’t matter that the quarter was ending, and Gephardt had a hundred money calls to make. He had to pump up the total so the press wouldn’t label him a pauper. (“Is Mr. Mitchelson there? This is Congressman Dick Gep-huh—? ... He just hung up! He came right on, then he hung up!
Hackhackhackheeheehee
...”)

Dick was like a kid out of school for the summer. His whole body changed. He’d strip off his suit coat and toss himself into his airplane seat as if he’d lost twenty pounds overnight. Tail winds blew him into Muscatine forty-five minutes ahead of schedule. (“Early! Can you
be-lieve
it?”)

They gave him a room at the tiny airport, and he meant to work the phones. Brad hauled out the laptop computer and scrolled the lists. But there was a TV, and Dick flicked it on—C-Span, of course. He stared with his head cocked. The show was
Road to the White House
, and this edition had a tape of Dukakis working an event. It was unedited—the tape just rolled on, unblinking ... a steady view of the Duke’s shoulder and cheek as he handshook (“Hi, Mike Dukakis ...”) his way through a crowd. It was banal—and revealing. You could hear every lame mumbled pleasantry ... every grunt.

“This is what killed Joe Biden,” Dick said. “Video regurgitation. I mean, is this TV? Should this be on?”

He started laughing at Michael’s halogen-lit mumbles.

“Would this be on ... in any other country?”

Brad held the phone, uncradled.

Dick suggested: “South Carolina?”

“Uh ...” Brad said, scrolling, “I got Minnesota.”

Brad dialed. Dick made a few stabs, but people weren’t in—6:00
P.M.,
not the best time. So Brad brought in a TV crew from St. Louis—they wanted an update on their hometown boy.

Had he changed?

“Nope,” Dick said with a grin. “Not at all.”

What surprised him?

“It’s like being in prison ... you never get to go where you want. You lose control. I expected us to have a plan, and we’d just go out and do our thing. But you’re just out there ... you lose control. You’ve
got
a plan—you plan for three years—doesn’t mean a thing.”

The TV woman from St. Louis asked if that made him unhappy.

Dick blinked once, slowly, and said to the lens:

“No ... happy to be in this. Happy to be here. Happy to walk away. Happy to be alive.”

Brad got the crew out. He was packing. They had a Democratic dinner in Muscatine ... no use falling behind now.

But Dick got the phone.

He held up a hand ... he’d dial.

“Hey, Bugs!” he said. “What’s goin’ on? ...”

After the surgery, Matt underwent treatments for another three years. Sometimes they were awful, still ... the doctors were always juggling the dosage of drugs. Sometimes it was scary, still... there were problems with the scar, sores, pains, side effects. ... When would this ever settle down? Years from now ... would there be years? That was the constant, overarching fear—so many times, with so many kids, the cancer came back, mostly in the lungs. But Matt’s case was rare. This type of cancer usually showed up first behind an eye. Maybe his remission would be rare, too. How could the doctors know? ... They could not. Dick and Jane could not. They could never be sure they were winning.

But they were winning. With every month of no news—not the worst news, anyway—Matt’s chances improved. With every month, the treatments were less a dance with death, and more a part of life.

What changed was attitude. That’s what Dick worked on, day by day. Dick said he wanted the most normal life for Matt, and for Dick that meant the most outward life. There were strangers at the house now—all kinds, Dick made sure of that. And trips for the family, and expeditions around the city. ... Dick and Jane had to decide whether to have another child. Was it right for Matt? Was it right for them? Was it safe? ... Dick said it would help take the focus off Matt. It would give
him
someone to look after. It would make everything more normal. Their daughter, Chrissie, was born in ’73.

Dick pushed himself outward. He was leader of the Young Turks on the Board of Aldermen ... and those fellows shook the whole city. They got the downtown—all of it—declared a “blighted area.” (That gave the city the power to develop whatever it could dream up.) They changed the neighborhood renewals from tear-down-and-build to restore-and-renovate. They found millions in new money from the feds, and channeled every dollar through a new agency (which one of their own Turks went on to head).

They were only a handful—four or five votes out of a total of twenty-eight—so they needed the blacks, and at least acquiescence from the old guard. That was Dick’s department: he was the bridge.

The leader of the old pols was one Albert “Red” Villa, a tavern owner from the South Side. Lots of politicians made pilgrimage to Red’s bar—election night, for instance, they’d buy a few beers. But Dick was the only Young Turk who’d bring his wife—spend some time, sit down and talk.

The city’s business nabobs formed a group, Civic Progress, that might have stopped progress altogether—but Dick would go out to the Bogey Club and talk to them, he was great with those folks. ... Soon he had them convinced they
all
had to make the system work.