It’s No Cure, but Curling Helps

Come spring, the cherry blossoms bloom. Buds of the larch trees burst. The snowcap of Mt. Asama melts. Brooks babble. Cuckoos call from the forest. The air here is said to be ozone-rich, but the beauty of Karuizawa is what can take your breath away.

Mike Peplinski teaches geography to Wisconsin seventh-graders. He would love to bring them here on a field trip. He could show them the “poetry walks,” which memorialize poets who came to Karuizawa to meditate or write. Perhaps the kids from Mr. Peplinski’s class could follow him to the Eikyu Bridge, where, according to folklore, child-like creatures from the forest leave banquet bowls, to be found by families who gather at the bridge for a wedding, or for a funeral.

Maybe Mike will do just that.

If he lives so long.

Wednesday will be his 24th birthday. He hopes to see 25, 40, 50, 100. A lot depends on his mom, and the kidney that Rita Peplinski will donate to her son, as soon as he gets home from the Winter Olympics.

Until then, he can be found here in enchanting Karuizawa, competing for the United States in curling, that quaint little sport with the brooms. Mike Peplinski adores curling. He has curled since the fourth grade. He will curl for as long as he is able. He is a continually cheerful young husband, father and teacher who so loves his other job-hobby that he exaggerates, “I couldn’t live without curling,” even though his health might force him to do just that.

“That’s true,” he says. “I’m a little worried about that. This is a possible one-time shot.” If ever a curler could have America cheering, it could be Mike Peplinski. It should be. A nicer guy on ice, one will never meet.

His condition is known as idiopathic membranous nephropathy. It is a rare kidney disease that is not congenital, has never affected anyone in his family before this. As soon as his mother, Rita, 56, found out how serious Mike’s condition was, she knew what her next step had to be.

“I’m going to be your donor,” she told him.

“Why?” Mike reacted, startled.

“Why? Wouldn’t any mother want to do this for her child?” asked Rita, living proof that a steel magnolia doesn’t grow only in the South.

She did not make this trip. Peplinski’s wife and sister are here, to cheer for him and to check up on him. Mike says that his wife, Michelle, can tell at a glance when his condition is worsening, when he is visibly weak, puffy or pale. At a junior competition once, Mike became quite sick. He had gone off one of his prescribed drugs. His immune system broke down, and everybody got a scare.

A doctor in Minnesota diagnosed the condition a few years ago, informing Peplinski that a transplant would be necessary five to 10 years down the road. At a work-up last August, the doctor told Mike they had reached that fork in the road. Casually as his bedside manner allowed, though, he added: “We can do it any time.”

“Can we do it next May or June?” Mike inquired.

“Why?” the doctor asked.

“So I can do my sport in the Olympics.”

Doctor looked at patient, and asked: “What sport?”

He knew nothing about curling. Peplinski’s pupils in Alma, Wis., meanwhile, knew nothing about the illness. The teacher finally sat with them for an hour recently and broke it to them, knowing that with the Olympics going on, they were going to hear about it. They are all very worried, he says. He instructed them not to be.

The transplant can be done “any time,” as long as the donor is known.

Peplinski says, almost matter-of-factly, “We have a much better chance of success with a live donor than a cadaver donor.”

He is on medications galore. Six, minimally, everything from diuretics to multivitamins to Tums. (“Something to do with my calcium,” Peplinski says of the heartburn tablets, laughing. “Maybe I can become the Tums spokesman.”) He has to be careful not to violate any of the Olympic bans on drugs, watch what he eats, particularly the sodium (“Japan doesn’t seem to care much about sodium,” he jokes) and get sufficient sleep, or else he won’t be able to function on the ice.

Nothing fazes him, though.

“With my carefree attitude,” Peplinski says, “I just don’t even worry about the drugs, as long as they work.”

Back home, he also teaches eighth-grade science. He coaches the Alma High School volleyball team. He teaches curling to a class of more than 500 children. Nobody outside of Wisconsin seems to know a single thing about curling in the United States, so it makes Mike laugh whenever he and his teammates travel to Canada for a competition, go into a hamburger joint for lunch and end up signing autographs.

As a kid in Centerville, Wis., he saw a sign:

COME JOIN OUR CURLING CLUB

So, he did.

“Three buddies and I joined up,” he said. “When we were 12 years old, we heard they were going to hold the junior national championships. So, the guys and me, we signed up. Well, only six teams signed up. And it was for ages 12 to 21.

“We went around for weeks after that, bragging, ‘We’re the sixth-best team in the nation!”’

It is a long way to Karuizawa. The sport of curling has brought Mike Peplinski here, to a town of ice sculpture and cherry woodwork, of linden trees and therapeutic hot-springs baths. He wishes nature alone could cure him. If it could, this would be the place.

People come around, wishing Peplinski well, apologizing if they are bringing up a depressing subject. Mike puts down his broom and speaks with anybody, gladly. He says, “My story’s unique. I know that. And you know what? If my condition helps us get more attention for curling, that would be great. I don’t mind. I’ll stand here all day. What else you want to know?”