Jill Takes Flight
March 3, 2000

"I'm going flying tomorrow," is what I thought Jill said when I talked to her on Tuesday. That didn't seem right, though. Her voice was very faint, and I recalled that she had turned down an earlier offer from her co-worker/guardian/saint Janice to go for a free glider ride that someone was offering to cancer patients. Because I realized that I wouldn't be able to get many details from her, I asked to talk to her father. When I asked if Jill was getting weaker, Red said, elliptically, "Oh, things are progressing around here." He did confirm that he and Jill were going for a ride in a private plane. Apparently, one of the social workers, acting on Jill's interests as stated in the hospice admission forms, arranged through the Dream Foundation to have a pilot take Jill up for a couple hours.

A day later I got a second-hand report from Janice. Whoever organized it, they clearly knew what Jill liked. They used a special hoist to lift Jill into the co-pilot seat, where she had a good view. They flew low over the water to get a good look at some whales and the Point Conception lighthouse, then flew through Gaviota pass and went for a close look at some peaks that were dusted with new snow. Finally they set a course for Lompoc. The pilot let Jill take the controls and make a pass right over her house. In Red's photos I see that she could only hold one hand on the yoke, but I'll bet she was wishing for a FIRE! button to make a mock strafing run down the middle of Sheffield Drive.

On the return flight, Red says, Jill fell asleep. Thursday night Janice called to tell me that Jill had been pretty sleeping nonstop since then, and to warn me not to expect much out of her when I went to visit on Friday. It could have been that the activity and excitement (that and having to get out of bed at 9 a.m.) wore her out and she'll have to sleep it off for a couple days. She said that one of the hospice people even used the word "coma." Jill's breathing had become very labored, and they put her on oxygen. Also they started a morphine IV because Jill hadn't been able to take the oral pain killers.

My drive to Santa Barbara on Friday took a bit longer than usual because of traffic delays in a couple places. I noticed a couple odd things about the trip. It was sunny nearly all the way until I got close to Santa Barbara, where it began to rain. (Just as well. I don't think I would recognize the place in sunshine.) And instead of Jill's usual hawk allies perched by the side of the highway I saw only two vultures, close to my destination.

When I got to my motel there was a message for me saying to go to Leigh Block House before checking in. When I got there Janice came out to meet me. She wouldn't answer my question, "What's going on?" but just looked at me and gave me a hug. Is she gone already? I was expecting that she might lie in a coma for weeks.

But I think Jill took wing two days earlier, before the pilot turned back from the flight. All that excitement may have hastened the end, but I think going out in style is better than lingering in a coma for weeks.

They gave me some time alone in her room. Her lips were a bit blue, but she didn't look much less lively than some of the last poses I saw her in. Her eyelids were still open a crack, and that's what made it clear that the spark was gone. Her cheeks and her arm were cold, and I lamented that, unlike the cold nights on some of our camping trips, even sitting in front of the fire, then taking a shot of whisky and going for a brisk walk would not restore enough warmth to let her sleep comfortably.

There will be no formal ceremony and no burial. Jill wasn't particular at all about what we do with her, and her father expresses no preference, so cremation seems a logical solution, and Jill's pilot friend Dino has been contacted about possibly scattering her to the winds. Her L.A.-area friends will probably want to get together and get "rat-assed" (a new expression I learned from Jamie, since she moved to England) and talk and laugh. I think we ought to be able to hold a fitting wake.