I was 11 years old when my father was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. I remember it clearly. The pink shirt I was wearing. My mother sitting me down on the sofa repeating what the doctor had said, “This is curable! If you get cancer, this is the one you want! They’ll take out his thyroid and he will be OK!”

I will never forget the first time I laid my eyes on the piece of ground where my dad took his last breath. My husband and I, along with our two children, made the long drive from our East Coast home to the rural Midwest town where my dad resided. Though I had spent my growing up years in the general area, I was only vaguely familiar with the stretch of road that would now be forever etched in my mind.