Nancy's Hopes

I walked over to the Neuro Unit at New York–Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medical Center on a cold and wet night to see Maggie after speaking with her mother that morning. It was now February 26, 2008, just a few months shy of the second anniversary of her stroke. As I crossed York Avenue, I thought about all that Nancy had shared with me about her daughter and herself. It was an informative interview, but so unbelievably sad. It was the first time I’d heard Maggie's story.

Nancy filled in the gaps of her biography. She was one of those kids who did it all. Academically strong and involved in enough co-curricular activities to keep several students busy. According to The Providence Journal, she was an honor roll student, dorm president, freshman captain of the crew team, and an Ultimate Frisbee player. She had studied abroad and did a semester in Granada, Spain. A classmate recalls Maggie as someone who “was rarely ever sitting still.” She was a whirlwind.

With no shortage of pride, Nancy told me that Smith College had awarded Maggie her bachelor's degree. Because her stroke occurred at the end of her senior year, she already had enough credits, so she was allowed to graduate. During commencement ceremonies, her classmates wore blue ribbons in solidarity with their friend. Stacey Baird, the president of the Smith class of 2006 and student speaker, dedicated her commencement address to Maggie.

By all accounts Maggie was an exceptional individual. Her friends mourning their early loss wrote essays and poems, all of which indicate the profundity of what a basilar artery stroke can do to injure the brainstem and shatter a promising life. At Middleboro Skilled Care Center, her friends put up one thousand origami paper cranes in her room, which according to Japanese legend promotes the return to health.