Organs I've Played: St Stephen's, Durham

When I was in high school we lived in Durham, NC. By that point I was very interested in playing piano and organ. I was taking piano lessons with one teacher, but really wishing I could study organ too. She suggested I move on to another teacher for organ. I did and was hooked. By the time I graduated high school Duke Chapel had installed its Flentrop organ in the rear gallery. Also about that time St Stephen's Episcopal Church installed a smaller but no less impressive Flentrop in their west end gallery.

It was remarkable for its French classical inflection Dutch builder for an American congregation). By this point my organ instructor was Kathy Cain whose husband was on the faculty at Duke. Through Kathy I met husband Bob Parkins, and through him others in organ culture in Durham. Ultimately I was introduced to Joe Kitchen at St Stephen's. I managed to score an invite to play the Flentrop there. It's remarkable too for the placement of drawknobs above the keydesk, at the player's head.

When Eli was traveling back and forth to Durham for glaucoma treatment this year, I knew I wanted to get back to see the organ anew. These picture are from that cloudy day visit in October.I also saw Dr Kitchen, who had no idea who I was from 30 years ago or so. But I really enjoyed seeing the instrument, even if (to Eli's frustration) I didn't play a single note!

Sam's Knob Hike, December 2016

 

I took Calvin and Briggs up on the Parkway today for a short hike. I had heard of Sam's Knob for a while, but we had never been. Over the weekend a Facebook friend went with his family; I was inspired. We went at midday to Brevard for a fast-food lunch. We ate that on the final leg of the trip: up US 276 to the Parkway. The access to Sam's Knob is just a few miles south. We were on the trail at about 130pm. The trail cuts across a glen before heading up the small-ish mountain.

 

We missed a switchback and found ourselves scrambling almost vertically! We picked the trail back up and made it the rest of the way with no trouble. On the way back down I realized that some of the tree trunks and limbs were arranged in such a way (at the point we missed the turn) to try to indicate the right direction. We had missed the signs on the way up. The view from the top was great. The past few days had been cloudy, typical December weather for us. But this day had really blown clear, prompting me to blow off a meeting at the office and spirit us away. After descending we headed back toward Asheville via the Parkway, seeing some places that we had visited before. The tunnels were a big hit (again). We got home about 430pm.

Rockmont 2016

 

Eli has been working at Rockmont again this year. He was assigned to "CCC" which is the camping and climbing crew. They handle logistics for boys doing camping experiences on- and off-campus and all manner of climbing. Eli's interest in climbing has steadily evolved. I'm not sure what really sold him on the sport. But we have been to a climbing wall in Asheville before which he really enjoyed. He seems to have taken to this job this summer quite well. He had to miss a couple of weeks due to eye surgery, but he was back at camp the instant the doc released him and the camp could get him back into the schedule. This is his last week of the season, though occasional gigs will continue through the fall. I was looking for pictures of Briggs in the camp photos, and happened upon this one of Eli helping a random camper.

Lego Camp

 

Calvin attended Lego camp right after school finished at the beginning of summer. The theme was "Star Wars," so it was a perfect fit. He attended the half-day camp for a week. The group of a dozen or so was all boys except for one very brave girl. Calvin had a blast getting his nerd on all week. They didn't get to bring much home, but Calvin did enjoy working with the robotic Lego components.

Glaucoma

In November 2014 we took Eli to our local optometrist for eyeglasses. He was complaining that some things in school were blurry. No problem we figured. The doc did a full eye exam and prescribed basic lenses. He also said the eye pressure (IOP) was high. We set a follow-up appoint for a couple of weeks later, to see what the pressure did over time, and at an earlier hour (pressures can be higher in the morning). The pressure was elevated still, so he gave us some eye drops. I have glaucoma so all of this seemed "normal" and somewhat of a script. The drops worked for a while, but the pressure went back up. We tried different drops with the same pattern: down and then back up. All through this I was talking with my ophthalmologist whenever I had an appointment. Finally in November 2015, the optometrist had run out of ideas; I took Eli to see my doc. He concurred with everything we had been doing: the right things. But he was convinced that Eli's glaucoma was the pediatric variety, which he said would not respond sustainably to eye drops. He urged us to see a specialist.

By this point Eli was getting ready for AmeriCorps in a matter of weeks. With so much up in the air (my doctor had said he was pretty sure some manner of surgery was going to be required) we let AmeriCorps know what was up, and they deferred Eli for 6 months. In a sense that was a let down, but in another way it was "one less thing" to deal with.

We had a couple of visits in Durham with a new doc who tweaked the drops with no effect. She suggested "selective laser treatment" of the eyes, a way to increase outflow of fluid from the eye that was minimally invasive. Eli had that in March. We had to dawdle three months to see if the treatment worked. It didn't. The Duke doctor suggested a different person at the same center, a specialist in pediatric glaucoma (Eli had missed working with her initially by being 2 years older than her age limit). But we wound up seeing her in late May. She recommended a trabulectomy on the right eye (its pressure was somewhat high than the left the day of our visit). Too, we could try one eye and see if the procedure worked without putting the left eye through surgical trauma needlessly if it didn't.

Eli had the trab this past week. He went on Wednesday and had the surgery that afternoon. The surgery went well. Eli has been working at Rockmont this summer, living there full-time, so I was pretty sure his adherence to his medication protocols was spotty at best. Before the surgery, without drops for a couple of days his IOP was 37/31. (Good numbers for a glaucoma patient are between 10 and 20.) A follow-up the next morning revealed promising numbers. He came on home Thursday afternoon. We saw our local optometrist on Friday, and the numbers were good still 11/16. We'll see my doctor in a couple of weeks, and then back to Durham in early August.

Glaucoma has taken up a big chunk of our time this year: the ups and downs of the effectiveness of eye drops, and the trips to Durham. Eli has remained pretty even-keeled, but he admitted to a co-worker at camp on Monday that he was a little anxious. He's never had surgery before. We'll see how things go over the next few weeks.