Tiny boy changes world

This column was published in the Tri-Valley Herald on June 24, 2008.

Aimee Hensley’s eyes are brown and her smile is contagious. She works in Livermore and lives in Manteca. She’s married to David. Adapted from her blog, this is her story about a boy who made a difference in the world:

Dameron Hospital, Stockton, Nov. 1, 2007: “Now at only 24 weeks, I was finding myself pushing. My water broke and nearly flooded the doctor and her staff. They induced contractions and 20 minutes later William David Hensley was born. He was tiny at 1 pound 8 ounces and only 12 inches long, but he was hanging in there. It was such an emotional roller coaster to see how tiny this little baby was, and how much he was fighting to live.”
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Nov. 3: “Will is now a little over 55 hours old and still fighting. The doctor was worried about his kidneys, but he is showing signs of improvement. He does not enjoy having his diaper changed because this morning his heart stopped three different times. This afternoon the doctor decreased his blood pressure medication, which is great. And his kidneys are continuing to improve. We are trying to remain optimistic, because he deserves a good chance at life.”
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Nov. 5: “Will had a brain ultrasound today and no bleeding was found. His skin is translucent, so we can see underneath the skin. During his blood transfusion yesterday you could actually see the blood flowing through his veins. At this point, we could not ask for better results. To see him making such strides is really a miracle right before our eyes.”
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Nov. 7: “Will is still proving to be fighter. I was able to visit for quite some time this afternoon, even during his assessment. But he did fine and I am glad I stayed because I got to hold his hand. Though Will is stable, we have a long road ahead of us. Please continue your thoughts and prayers; he needs them now to stay strong and defy the odds.”
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Nov. 8: “I always have anxiety driving to the hospital and going up to the 3rd floor, but once I see how peaceful he is, I feel much better. When parents talk about the overwhelming love they feel for their children, I always wondered how that felt. Now I know how that feels.”
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Nov. 9: “Will is breathing well today and is starting to move around quite a bit. This shows he is not suffering from pain, but we also don’t want him to use up all his energy showing off his new dance moves. Each day is a new day and we are so thankful for him. He is now just over eight days old and fighting strong with a WILL to live!”
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Nov. 12: “Today was the best day yet! I was able to hold the little man for an entire hour.”
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Nov. 14: “They stopped his feedings due to residue in his tummy. His blood sugar has been high, so they are giving him insulin. His oxygen has been low, so they increased the oxygen on his ventilator. His blood pressure has been low, so he is back on Dopamine. And yesterday they gave him a second dose of Curosurf that helps when he is in respiratory distress. All of this sounds overwhelming, and it is. But everything happening is expected with a micro preemie. What really matters is how he handles the treatment.”
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Nov. 15: “The little man is starting to open his eyes. They won't do a vision test until December, but he responds to our voices, so I know he is aware of our presence, even if at this point he cannot see us.”
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Nov. 20: “Will continues to love to lie on his tummy. We are consistently seeing a ‘poopie’ diaper! I know this sounds gross, but as tiny as he is, pooping on his own is great news.”
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Thanksgiving: “We have so much to be thankful for. Last night our nurse was wiping his mouth and Will started sucking on her finger. She let me place my pinky into his mouth to feel his sucking.”
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Nov. 23: “Kangaroo Care is an essential part of Will's recovery. It’s where Will is placed directly onto my chest for skin-to-skin contact and so he can sense my heartbeat. This immediately benefited his oxygen level, blood pressure and heart rate. Dads also can hold their baby and bond with Kangaroo Care.”
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Nov. 30: “This morning the nurse noticed blood in his stool. They stopped his feedings and ordered an x-ray. One thing they are trying to avoid is infection of the intestines, called necrotizing enterocolitis, or NEC. In addition this afternoon Will starting looking pale, so they ordered a blood transfusion and tests. For the majority of the day his oxygen was good until about 5 p.m. when his oxygen dropped lower than I have ever seen it before.”
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Late evening, Nov. 30: “I am so extremely sad to post that this evening our precious little Will passed away. He gave us and many family and friends a wonderful month. Even though many of you did not meet him personally, you touched his heart. His passing came so quickly that no one was prepared. In the end, NEC took its toll more aggressively than anyone could have ever imagined.”
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Today, six months after Will’s passing, Aimee Hensley thinks about her baby every day: “We were with Will for each of the 30 days of his lifetime,” she said, her brown eyes welling with tears. “He was our little boy, and because he lived he’s changed the world for other premature babies who follow him at Dameron Hospital.”
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Until Will came along, the medical staff didn’t use Kangaroo Care as a treatment. One nurse insisted it be tried, and Will’s positive responses to being placed on his mother’s chest impressed the doctors. Now every nurse is trained in the technique.
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What a wonderful legacy for a 12-inch boy who even today is touching the lives of other babies on their embattled road to survival.













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Father's Day 2008

Published in the Tri-Valley Herald June 17, 2008

For Father’s Day we drove down to Los Gatos to hang out with my dad and mom. My parents are in their mid-seventies and just celebrated their 57th wedding anniversary. They met as teens in southern California, but they’ve lived most of their lives in the same house in Los Gatos, built in 1914, where we moved when I was in third grade.

My dad enjoys our visits, and especially likes to goof around with his grandkids. He’s been overheard asking my daughters such questions as “Did they suck your brains out at school?”

In fact, he’s known in the family for funny and odd phrases repeated over the years. Two summers ago my mom typed up every repetitive expression we could think of that my dad has uttered. She then surprised him with a book for his birthday dedicated “to all who have heard Bill’s words and remembered them over the years.”

My mom gathered the expressions through email. For several weeks my brother, sister, and I emailed my mom with memories as she secretly recorded each phrase. "How could we forget ‘Cool at the motor pool,’” my brother emailed. “Or ‘Thank you very little,’” my sister recalled.

The book is 14 pages, categorized into sayings, rules, advice, songs, and behaviors. Two of his rules, for example, are “Park away from other cars” and “Get rid of old magazines.”

His advice runs the gamut from “Never say no when you can say yes” to “Don’t buy it unless you need it, then don’t buy it.”

A Depression-era baby, my dad was born in 1930 in Buffalo, New York. His mother died when he was three, and his father worked in a steel mill. After high school, my dad enlisted with his twin brother in the Air Force and then went to college. He became a History and English teacher, and later a guidance counselor at a community college.

No doubt his career informed his perspective about education, whose purpose, as my mom quotes in the book, “is to teach people to think critically so they can make considered decisions that affect their lives.”

Yet in spite of the occasional erudite pronouncements, my dad’s phrases are mostly humorous, such as: “I think I slipped a disk in my brain” and, holding up a fist, “How’s about a knuckle sandwich?”

As I thumb through the hand-crafted book today, stories well up around certain phrases, such as one that simply reads: “The tree’s a-fallin!’”

This expression came from a stormy night in 1971 when rains and torrential winds threatened the grand old sycamore that grew between our house and the house next door. The winds were so strong that the tree was bumping into both homes.

As legend has it, our neighbor, Mr. Cunningham, rose in the middle of the night to pull on his rain boots and heavy coat and hat to come over to our front door with his dire news about the faltering tree. Picture if you will Mr. Cunningham with a wild look in his eyes and his hair all sticking up and crazy. (I know I just said he was wearing a hat, but childhood memories are like that and besides, I slept through the whole thing.) He bangs on our door, and as my mother and father stumble half asleep to answer, Mr. Cunningham, like some character in a gothic novel, cries out--as if something could be done about it--“The tree’s a-fallin!’”

I’ll never forget the image, in the stormless quiet of the morning, of my sister standing on the fallen massive tree in the long driveway that leads to the back of my parents’ home, its long dark branches silent and helpless.

Such are the memories captured in my mom’s little book. And such are the expressions stored in some lobe of my dad’s wondrous brain that under a microscope surely looks like a Rube Goldberg contraption.

Volunteer rides with a heart for community

This column was published in the Tri-Valley Herald on June 10, 2008.

A few weeks ago, Jerry Pentin was riding his bicycle along Calaveras Road near the Sunol Regional Wilderness. Like most of his excursions along this favorite route, the ride was scenic, but uneventful.

That is, until a mountain lion stepped onto the road 25 feet ahead.

“I let out a loud and long ‘Wow!’” said Pentin, who lives in Pleasanton.

This startled the lion, which simultaneously looked at Pentin and crouched, then scurried across the road to jump 8 feet onto a hillside. It then jumped up another 8 feet and looked down at Pentin as he came to a stop to admire the cat.

“I've spent my life in the outdoors of California,” said Pentin, 51, who owns Spring Street Studios, a video production firm that has served most of the big companies in Silicon Valley. The studio has also shot hours of wildlife footage for a diverse clientele.

“I've shot video of desert tortoises, rattle snakes, ospreys, and sharks,” Pentin said, “and I’ve encountered bobcats and lynx along with lots of wild critters over the years.”

Since Pentin started cycling a few years ago, he has seen raptors, elk, a fox, a coyote, and now the mountain lion. “I even had a bald eagle fly right over my head just a few weeks ago,” he said.

While Pentin enjoys cycling for exercise and has ridden over 1,800 miles this year alone, he’s become something of an advocate for cycling in Pleasanton.

“I’m currently the vice chair of the Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Committee,” said Pentin, who also serves as a Parks and Recreation commissioner since 2004 and is the liaison to the East Bay Regional Park District. “The advisory committee has been formed to create a master plan to make Pleasanton a friendlier place for bicyclists and pedestrians," he said.

Community involvement is a way of life for Pentin. As a member of Rotary since 1984, he has participated in numerous community projects, and chaired for three years an annual event where local service clubs worked together to provide repairs and litter clean up throughout Pleasanton.

In March 1997, he was appointed to the Pleasanton Golf Course Committee by then-mayor Ben Tarver after a meeting with Tarver and council members Sharrell Michelotti and Kay Ayala.

“We thought it would take between a year and 18 months for the committee to complete its work on Callippe Preserve,” Pentin said. The course opened eight years later in November 2005. “Not exactly a short 18 months."

Pentin, who served in the Marines and is distantly related to the famous feuding Hatfields, was also appointed to the Veterans Building Task Force, which oversaw renovation of the historic hall, and he has participated in various other committees over the years, including Trails Ad Hoc and the Kottinger Place task force. “One of my favorite task forces involved public art in the downtown,” he said.

Along with donating his time, Pentin often involves the talented employees of Spring Street Studios in creating videos to support fundraisers.

“I'm proud of the work my studio has produced over the years with non-profits,” he said. The videos have raised tens of thousands of dollars, especially for wheelchairs, many of which Pentin has personally delivered with other Pleasanton North Rotarians in Nicaragua, Peru, Bolivia and Mexico.

Pentin credits his wife of 24 years, Josine, with allowing him to dedicate so much time to volunteer work. “I’m blessed to have found someone who understands my passion for community,” he said, adding, with a twinkle in his blue eyes, “and she's pretty darn good looking too.”

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When he’s not serving others or pursuing his goal to cycle 3,660 miles this year, Pentin enjoys supporting his daughter and her pursuit of golf. “I’ve traveled with Joi to more than 100 tournaments over the years, many that take us all over the United States,” he said.

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Pentin first gave his daughter a set of clubs at age four. She showed a knack for the game, and now, at 16, has played in three Junior World Championships and in two Walmart 1st Tee Opens at Pebble Beach, along with other national junior tournaments.

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“I enjoy serving our community and participating in my various roles in life,” Pentin said, “but my favorite role is as Joi’s dad.”