Reflecting on the past, facing the future

When Rob Morgan walks into Lois Grant's room, the spirited 82-year-old woman takes note that a “good looking guy” has come to visit.

Morgan visits Grant at her home in the Country Oaks Care facility in Santa Maria about once a week to play the Native American flute for the woman who spent the better part of two decades on a North Dakota reservation.

Today Morgan has brought Grant's favorite flute, a wooden instrument from El Salvador that has a rich B-flat tone. Standing at the foot of her bed, he begins to play; soon, Grant is humming along.

Wrapped in a blanket, lounging in her bed, Grant's frail and ailing body remains in Santa Maria, but her mind is carried away to somewhere else by Morgan's notes.

“It makes a beautiful sound,” Grant says. “I love his playing.”

Morgan is one of many visitors that come to see Grant as part of the hospice care she is receiving from Hospice Partners of the Central Coast. Grant has been in the program for about three months after deciding against chemotherapy for treatment of her colon cancer.

She was diagnosed with cancer about four years ago after suffering and then recovering from a stroke on her right side, said her daughter Barbie Rozek of Santa Maria. The stroke also brought on dementia.

Grant had surgery to deal with the cancer but subsequent tests showed that the disease was still present in her lymph nodes.

“She said she didn't want to go through chemo and it was just too much,” recalled Rozek, who is one of Grant's eight children. “So we thought, ‘Well, what would be the next best thing?' Because she was losing a lot of weight and being able to get up less and less.”

That's when the family learned that Grant qualified for hospice care.

Though Rozek is a registered nurse with Hospice Partners of the Central Coast, she is not part of the hospice care team treating her mother.

As Grant recalls some of her life's milestones, Rozek guides the conversation to help her mother filter out some of the fantasy that colors many of her memories.

Born in 1925 in upstate New York, Grant's life has led her many places from her childhood home of Watertown. After high school, the young beauty lived briefly in New York City, where she modeled bathing suits.

Some of the photo shoots brought her a brush with fame when she modeled with Olympic gold medalist Johnny Weissmuller, the swimmer who many people know better as Tarzan from the movies of the 1930s and '40s.

“He's a wonderful guy,” Grant recalled, and joked that every day before dinner he would try to imitate the famous Tarzan yell.

Despite Grant's dementia, which at times leaves her confused, her sense of humor is still intact. When asked what she did after modeling, she quipped, “Well, that was just the other day.”

After leaving New York, Grant met and married her first husband, Harley Gardner, while in her early 20s. The two settled in Framingham, Mass., where they raised eight children.

The couple was married for about 20 years, Rozek said, and after they were divorced, Grant stayed in Massachusetts and went to Framingham State College, where she studied home economics.

Eventually, she met Pete Grant and the two were married. It was Pete who took her to the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians reservation in North Dakota.

When he died, Grant stayed and lived in a small mobile home on the reservation for more than 20 years, Rozek said, and really enjoyed living there.

On the reservation, Grant tutored students, taught at a community college and learned about herbal medicine and plants, Rozek said, recalling that when she moved her mother off the reservation her home was filled with posters and books about various plants.

Somewhere along the way, Grant also learned how to read palms - which she does with her own brand of humor - and became interested in astrology and signs of the zodiac as well. Her first question for many visitors is, “What month are you?” - looking for a person's date of birth and therefore astrological sign.

It was Rozek who connected Morgan, one of the many hospice volunteers, and her mother. She thought her mom would enjoy hearing him play the Native American flute since she treasured her time on the reservation.

Between songs Morgan and Grant have a friendly chat, although her short-term memory problems keep the conversation going in a loop.

But Morgan is patient and continues the discussion each time she asks what key he is playing in, or when his birthday is, or whether he made the beaded bands that adorn his flutes.

The two often talk about the bead work on the flutes - some of which he did make - and she tells him about the beading she used do, Morgan said.

Usually she tells him his craftsmanship is “good - for a man.”

Malia Spencer can be reached at 739-2219 or mspencer@santa

mariatimes.com.

March 2, 2008