A Heartfelt Holiday : Family and Friends Help Cancer Victim Mark Last Christmas

Karen Riggs pulled Santa Clauses, snowballs, Christmas quilts and toy villages out of the box as she helped her sister-in-law decorate her home last weekend. But she stopped when she came to the straw angels.

This will be the last Christmas 43-year-old Ann-Marie White will have with her husband, Tom, and her two boys, Michael, 9, and Benjamin, 3, and Riggs was afraid the angels would be a sad reminder of the cancer that has racked her sister-in-law’s body and lodged in her brain.

Two weeks ago, the doctors told Tom White to prepare for the end. Last Sunday the Whites made a family decision to go ahead and have a “normal” Christmas. Including the angels.

“We decided to make it as good a Christmas as we can,” Riggs said.

And the family is getting a lot of help from friends and strangers alike.

Wednesday night, a full contingent of teachers, staff members and administrators from the Magnolia School District crammed around the hospital bed where White is confined in her living room, singing every Christmas carol they could think of. They also handed her a lifetime service award for the 20 years she has put in teaching severely handicapped preschoolers at Lord Baden Powell Elementary School in Anaheim.

Residents of the Mabury Ranch neighborhood, where the Whites live, are also helping the family get ready for Christmas.

“To me, it’s absolutely amazing what is happening in this small community,” Riggs said.

A paramedic who lives across the street is on call day and night in case of an emergency. Another neighbor brings a full dinner over at least once a week. After the White family had trouble finding medication late at night, a pharmacist who lives across the road volunteered to open his store and get needed drugs when emergencies arise. “And we don’t even know this man,” Riggs said.

“This is the way the world used to be 50 years ago,” said Marcia Hormell, Tom White’s mother. “And we’ve lost this.”

Much of this spirit comes from White herself, whom friends and family describe as a private woman who rarely displays emotions.

“It’s just amazing. Her attitude has been so positive,” Hormell said. “She’s never let on to anyone but Karen and me and her husband that she’s scared.”

White’s 20 years of work with disabled children helped her keep a practical attitude when illness forced her into a wheelchair.

“A lot of people think of a wheelchair as a defeat, but I think of it as a means of conserving my energy,” White said. “I figured if a 3-year-old can do this, I can do it. It doesn’t take all of the scariness away, but it does put it in a positive perspective.”

It was a little different when a teacher came by several weeks ago with a gold road-runner charm--a reminder of the school’s mascot--that the school gives to retirees.

“It made it more final,” White said. It was one of the few times her family saw her sob.

But White had accepted the idea that she would never teach again by the time her colleagues came to the house to serenade her Wednesday night.

“It was really special,” she said. “It’s one thing when your peers do it for you, but when higher up people come from the school board and the district, it’s a real neat touch.”

Hormell said she had to go into the kitchen to cry when the group started singing “Have a Very Merry Christmas.” But White’s husband, a manager at Rockwell International Corp., said it reminded him of old times and gave him a much-needed lift.

“It was neat to see how her co-workers felt about her,” he said. “It was reminiscent of some of the parties we used to have. It wasn’t sad at all. Everybody was drinking cider and having a good time.”

Tom White said he was also surprised at how many people at work have made truly meaningful and persistent offers of help.

“You expect it from the few people who are close to you, but it’s really surprising how broad-based the support is,” he said.

The next hurdle will be to get through Christmas itself, Riggs said. Hormell usually cooks prime rib and Yorkshire pudding on Christmas Eve, but this year the family is preparing just hot hors d’oeuvres, not sure what White’s condition might be.

But family members said it’s important to try to keep up tradition.

“That is most definitely important with two small kids,” White said. “That has been one of our biggest things. Things are not the same, but we would like to have them appear to be the same. It’s real important to the kids.”