Everett grandmother faces cancer without a flinch

Published 9:00 pm Saturday, August 12, 2006

Esther Long approaches life head-on: “You do what you have to do.”

She doesn’t say that gritting her teeth. Life hasn’t always been kind, but there isn’t a hint of bitterness in her voice.

At 91, she feels the effects of a terrible cancer. You’d never guess it.

Long greets a visitor with a pretty smile. Her handshake is surprisingly strong. She lives independently in an apartment in an old house near downtown Everett. She’s been there since 1969.

A chat with Long quickly finds its way to a place once a fixture downtown – the Sport Center Cafe. For 35 years, she was a waitress there.

Under an orange neon sign at 1709 Hewitt Ave., Sport Center regulars found old friends, big breakfasts, card games, horse-racing forms, cigars, drinks and a clientele as tough as waterfront workers and as well-heeled as downtown bankers and lawyers.

Long can still name names – artist Bernie Webber, attorney Victor Haglund, former City Councilman Carl Gipson and, most notably, U.S. Sen. Henry M. “Scoop” Jackson. She recalls once helping Jackson get his Everett Herald when, she said, he was baffled by a new newspaper box outside the cafe.

“I sometimes worked graveyard, 10 p.m. to 6 a.m.,” Long said. “I was head waitress. If someone else couldn’t come in, I’d work a double shift.”

After decades of being on her feet waiting tables at the Sport Center, Long can still say “that was a big, happy family. I was sad to see that place go.”

The second-eldest of 11 children, Long grew up in rural Minnesota. Her father decided only his sons needed a high school education. In Spokane, she and her husband ran a small cafe, Bill &Esther’s Place. He’d been a Navy man. The couple had four children. They divorced in 1966. He remarried, but she never did.

After retiring at 72, Long filled her days with her children, grandchildren, an exercise group at the YMCA, and cake-decorating classes.

In the fall of 2004, a month before her 90th birthday, Long was diagnosed with rectal cancer. Despite her age, she didn’t hesitate about an aggressive fight against the disease.

Under the care of Dr. Elizabeth Miley of the Western Washington Medical Group in Everett, Long has undergone two rounds of chemotherapy. She also recently completed radiation treatments at the John E. Flynn Radiation Oncology Center at Providence Everett Medical Center’s Pacific campus.

“I never went to high school, but I’ve got two diplomas,” said Long, holding certificates from the Flynn center signed with congratulatory notes from the staff there.

Long said she had little choice but to joke her way through the indignities of those treatments. “You have to laugh at the world,” she said.

Long’s health problems aren’t gone. She has pain in her groin and one leg is swollen, but she’s wary of pain medication. “I didn’t want to get hooked on pain pills,” she said.

Recently, Long earned a new label as a role model to her grown granddaughter. The circumstances were unwelcome, but they’ve made an already strong bond all the stronger.

Long’s granddaughter, 45-year-old Kim Meritt of Bothell, was diagnosed with breast cancer in May. “I’m very lucky. It’s considered stage zero; it had not spread,” Meritt said.

She had a lumpectomy and is now in the middle of radiation treatments at the Flynn center, where her grandmother was treated. Meritt said she felt like a celebrity of sorts when staff members there discovered who she was.

“All the people at the Flynn center were saying, ‘Oh, my gosh, you’re Esther Long’s granddaughter,’” Meritt said. “She’s just so tough, she’s so positive. Whenever I ask how she’s doing, she’ll say it does no good to complain. Now, she’s going through this with me.

“I already knew what a special woman she is,” Meritt said. “Having her is such an inspiration. How can I complain, when I have her to look up to?”

Columnist Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460 or muhlsteinjulie@heraldnet.com.