Each time I see a balloon, my mind flies back to a memory of when I was a six-year-old girl. It was a rainy Sunday and my father had recently died. I asked my mom if Dad had gone to heaven. "Yes, honey. Of course." she said.

"Can we write him a letter?"

She paused, the longest pause of my short life, and answered, "Yes."

My heart jumped. "How? Does the mailman go there?" I asked.

"No, but I have an idea." Mom drove to a party store and returned with a red balloon. I asked her what it was for.

"Just wait, honey. You'll see." Mom told me to write my letter. Eagerly, I got my favorite pen, and poured out my six-year-old heart in the form of blue ink. I wrote about my day, what I learned at school, how Mom was doing, and even about what happened in a story I had read. For a few minutes it was as if Dad were still alive. I gave the letter to Mom. She read it over, and a smile crossed her face.

She made a hole in the corner of the letter where she looped the balloon string. We went outside and she gave me the balloon. It was still raining.

"Okay, on the count of three, let go. One, two, three."

The balloon, carrying my letter, darted upward against the rain. We watched until it was swallowed by the mass of clouds.

Later I realized, like the balloon, that Dad had never let his sickness get him down. He was strong. No matter what he suffered, he'd persevere, hang on, and finally transcend this cold world and his sick body. He rose into sky and became something beautiful. I watched until the balloon disappeared into the gray and white and I prayed that his strength was hereditary. I prayed to be a balloon.

I believe in figuring out my own way to do things. This approach can yield great results, but it's got its negative sides. Much of my individualist, bone-headed nature comes from my grandfather.

Opa grew up in New York's rough-and-tumble Lower East Side, didn't go to college, but owned and ran two successful business: a restaurant and a car wash. He figured out what he wanted to do, and how to do it without studying a manual. He used his own creativity to solve problems as they came up.

After he died, realtors (房产经纪人) tried to sell his home. They discovered he had devised his own way of hooking up the septic system. No one could figure out how it worked, so it couldn't pass codes. But it worked, and for many years beyond his time.

Sometimes I wonder if my banjo (班卓琴) playing would pass codes. I didn't learn to play bluegrass, classic music or jazz in school. I took banjo lessons from some of the best, but my breakthrough moments came when I left the lesson plans. I remember seeing jazz great Chick Corea when I was 17. There was a moment of revelation when I realized that all the notes he was playing had to exist on my banjo. I went home and stayed up most of the night, figuring out the scales, modes and arpeggios (琶音) for myself, mapping out the banjo fingerboard in my own way.

When I perform with my own group, my map of the banjo is all I need. But when I move into, more conventional jazz or classical situations, I don't always have the tools to fit in. I can barely read music. I don' thoroughly understand the conventions of each tradition and I'm not sure how to voice jazz chords — which notes to leave out and all the rhythmic concepts. I worry that my approach might not be built on a strong enough musical foundation.

It's this fear that allows me no rest in my musical pursuits. When I'm at work — whether it is writing, practicing or editing and mixing CDs — I obsess. To say that I am picky is understatement. Delegating is pretty much impossible; I can be downright controlling. I have to get everything just right. Then, one day, the intensity disappears. This usually means the project is done.

Some of my earliest memories of Mother come from the time we lived in Prairie Village. I was about 3 years old. Mother would take me on nature hikes along the small river’s banks.

In the bushes we found insects, cocoons（茧）and butterflies. She made a butterfly net for me. While running after a butterfly in our back yard, I put the net down. Mother and I built snowmen, much taller than I, and we laughed aloud after a snowball fight. In the season of rain and flowers, singing birds and sunny mornings, the cocoon broke open, and a brilliant white butterfly came out.

One of our favorite books was “The Tale of Mr. Jeremy Fisher.” I would sit at Mother's side as she read the story. I consider the years spent with Mother “On the River” a foundation to a lifelong interest in science, inspiring me, in part, to choose a career in medicine. I recall sitting with Mom on the front of the house in Baldwin late one June evening. Dad’s tail-lights were disappearing quickly as he drove off to see his Dad, who was dying in Garnett.

Mom said, “Oh, kids, we’re only here for such a short time....” Her words were also kind of scary to me at the time, because what I heard her say was that we are all destined(注定）to die, and she had told me once before that she was afraid to die. I guessed her message was more than “Our life on earth is short and we are all destined to die” She meant that “Make the most of life while you can, here on earth. Reach for the stars!”. Mother also said “Oh, kids! We’ll have the stars!” She had 5 of the stars she’d brought onto this earth. In 1963, 6th star was added, named Kip.

All of us did well in our life. 1971 found me attending Baker University, and I found a star and married her in the middle of medical school. I have added four more stars: Dean, Christine, Dan, and Dave. Dean found a star and married her. He and Shakeena now have 3 stars: Demetrius, Olivia, and Maxwell. Mom loved babies, children, and youth so much... We have the stars!