Remembering Lisa
Lisa Wollman Bolick passed away last week from ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s Disease.
I’d rather drown, or be strangled to death or maybe be set on fire. Those are fast ways to die. This is a slow chipping away. Your brain is intact, but your body slowly stops cooperating until … you die.
Lisa and I met when she joined James Sprunt Community College as the graphic design instructor. I was next door to her complex in the media production center, the public relations arm of the college.
Lisa and I hit it off right away. We were both opinionated with certain opinions. We both had a respect for the arts and I had a deep respect for hers.
It wasn’t just that she could whip that computer into doing her design desire, or that she could create such incredible jewelry. She didn’t just do … she could teach. I know. I talked with her students who were both inspired and intimidated by her.
It was her depth of passion for everything that caught her eye. We talked politics. She made jewelry in her own way. Screw everybody else.
I remember vividly the day she told me she was having trouble with her thumbs. A short time later it became hard to type. She couldn’t do her jewelry anymore.
Then came the diagnosis.
Maybe it was okay, they said. She was young. It had been diagnosed early, they said.
But she couldn’t do her job anymore, so she and her husband, Jay, moved back to home ground in Pennsylvania to be among family.
I considered her a part of mine.
Jay, I love you both.
