Preface   (Condensed Version)

The two of us were trying to shoehorn just one more briefcase into the trunk of my car. “It’s not going to fit Dad,” said Tori Lou, in her junior-adjutant voice. I was hearing her sound more and more grown up lately, more sure of herself and unabashed in expressing her opinions. I wasn’t entirely ready for her ascension into adolescence.  “Now I think if we can cram it this way, then back,” I offered. “It still won’t go,” she responded, without a moment’s hesitation. That’s the way kids are today; so much more certain of just about everything, while we parents are less sure of just about anything.

That’s how it began; a sunny Sunday morning in Wisconsin, May 9th, 2004.  Me in my sixty-third year, capably advised by my thirteen-year-old daughter, preparing to drive solo on the first leg of the journey of our lives – well – my life to be sure. Ten weeks earlier, as winter melted into spring, I heard the disquieting news from the doctors... “You have prostate cancer. We need to decide what to do.”

In the buzz and blur, within which I suddenly became enveloped, a voice from the far corner of my being reminded me that my life story was about to change inexorably, with the ending incomplete. All bets off; no dues left to pay. Saying goodbye to Tori Lou, knowing I would not see her for about two months, I aimed the convertible toward California and drove off, sobbing all the way to Cedar Rapids.

Three months later there we were - Bill and Tori Lou, soaring eastward  across the Nevada desert, cruise control set, convertible top down, CD player up full-blast, singing Come Fly With Me at the top of our lungs. We were headed back to Madison, a novice cancer survivor and his future-superstar daughter, just days away from completing the magnificent journey which occupied almost three months of my life and five weeks of hers.

This is the story of that journey.

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