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---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 02 Jun 94 15:53:59 EDT From: [log in to unmask] To: [log in to unmask] Subject: 1st Greetings Dear Barb and PARKINSN friends: I am so pleased to find you! Have been around computers and communications for many years, but I just NOW have one finger in Internet, and via AOL this is my first LISTSERV subscription. Thanks, Barb, for your help in getting registered and for your welcome message... -- My interest in PD is via my sister, Barbara Coleman of Carlsbad New Mexico. Barbara is 63 and has had PD about 13 years. No one in the family knew for about the first 4 years, except her loving husband John. Then, her son Randy and I "tricked" Barbara into buying a Macintosh computer, and she hasn't stopped writing since! The first thing she began to write was her Parkinson's Journal, although we didn't see it for two more years. It is her personal history of dealing with PD. As you would appreciate, it is both heartwarming and terrifying. Her PD doctor (Dr. Hutton, Texas Tech University - Lubbock, Texas) has given her high praise for her "patient's eye view" of the disease...something that is hard for doctor's to experience unless they have PD. At any rate, I am very proud of her and John and the battle they are waging with this disease. -- We have made several attempts to get her journal published, as a contribution to the PD community. One non-profit publisher has her on his waiting list. I would be interested in hearing from other list members who have published about their PD experiences are wish to. -- I will close with one of Barbara's recent poems: THE USURPER Listen to me, you stone-faced old woman. What are you doing in my mirror? Hands shaking...mouth drawn tight Bent and twisted...staring back at me. You think you can lay claim to my life And even determine my death, But you are not really me. I am still very much alive inside you. Someday I will slip you off Like a snake sheds his old skin. Your days are numbered Because we WILL conquer Parkinson's disease. (Barbara Thompson Coleman 1/94) Ray Thompson ([log in to unmask])