|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Letters
Send submissions to wittmagazine@wittenberg.edu
Alumnus remembers dead friend Éditor’s Note: Gil Belles, ’62, submitted the following tribute to Robert Horn, ’64. Horn was diagnosed with Lou Gerhig’s disease in 1988. See page -- for story on the Horn scholarship. Robert C. Horn, ’64, and I were Phi Gamma Delta fraternity brothers at Wittenberg. We shared rides back and forth from Detroit to Springfield. History professor Robert Hartje was our mentor. We went off to graduate studies and college faculties. Bob taught international politics with a Russian emphasis in California, while I taught U.S. history with an African-American emphasis in Illinois. In February 1994, I called Bob to see how he and his wife, Judy Eppers, ’64, survived the Northridge earthquake. That’s when I learned that Bob was hooked to a ventilator and feeding tube. Bob has had Lou Gehrig’s disease (ALS) since 1988. Moving his right toe and his eyebrows are the only physical movements Bob can control. Before I had time to internalize that tremendous change in his life, Judy sent me the newspaper articles, Sunday church sermons and family newsletters that Bob had managed to write. I considered them to be exceptional until he topped it off in 1997 with his book, How Will They Know if I’m Dead: Transcending Disability and Terminal Illness. Bob wrote it using the toe of his right foot and a computer mouse. I doubt that anyone who reads the book will consider the experience ordinary. Indeed the writing of the book was extraordinary. His prose flows effortlessly without remorse or self-pity. At times Bob uses humor, sarcasm and wit as he describes his journey from one state of normality to an altered and different state of normality. His undiminished mind leads readers through the stages of adjusting to new and less responsive physical activities. I tended to forget it took Bob an entire day to type a half a page with his toe. Bob personifies a cliché that more of us need to heed. He was given a huge bag of lemons and is now sharing sweet lemonade with his friends. Life is pretty much how we each perceive it. The order and rationale that we each attach to the conditions around us are products of our own doing. We are empowered to make our time and space the best possible, and Bob teaches all of us that valuable lesson. As Wittenbergers, we find special comfort knowing that the author sprouted his roots in the same soil. Gil Belles, ’62 
Wittenberg Magazine P.O. Box 720 Springfield, Ohio 45501-0720 Phone: (937) 327-6141 Fax: (937) 327-6112 |
|
