Backstory for "whining causes blisters"

         Journal notes October 23, 2002
Dear God, give the doctors wisdom in treating Cathy's Breast Cancer. David wrote that it is Stage 4 with metastasis to her liver.
Sorrow washes over me as I read the email from my brother.
         

Cathy has been part of my life since I was 15 years old. She and David met at the bus stop during his senior year and her junior year of High School. Cathy's foster parents were against her dating David. David worked as a busboy at Aurelio's Pizza late into the nights, and often fell asleep whenever he sat down. They assumed he was dozing off after partying.
When David went away to University of Iowa for freshman year, he sent me letters with a few sentences for me and a request to pass the enclosed notes to Cathy at the bus stop.

They continued to date secretly while Cathy's relationship with her foster parents deteriorated.
Following high school graduation, Cathy decided to move to New Hampshire where her older brother lived. David said, "If you're going, I am going, too."

On an early spring day in 1980, they loaded up my dad's green Karmann Ghia, and her old Seville and headed East.

Cathy found work in a Brookstones store in Peterborough, New Hampshire. David started work as an ironworker, a welder, for Cathy's brother.

David and Cathy returned to Illinois for their wedding in 1981, and then permanently made their home in New Hampshire.

Ironically, the steady work David found in welding may have been the cause of Cathy's Breast Cancer. She was exposed to the chemicals on his work clothes as she laundered them for more than 20 years. Several other wives of the welders also were diagnosed with Breast Cancer.