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Ardys is dying of pancreatic cancer. Doctors give her just six months, though you wouldn’t know by looking at her. The grandmother has a full head of curly, brown hair. She touches your arm when she speaks. She jokes and laughs.
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Ardys Malesker, 69, left, of Winona, and Tom Thorson stop at the Lakeview Drive Inn on Thursday for frosty mugs of root beer. Thorson, owner of Valley Motors in Winona, was fulfilling Malesker’s wish by giving her a ride around town in a 1955 Ford Sunliner convertible. Malesker, who has terminal pancreatic cancer, has wanted to ride in a pink convertible since she was nine years old. "I finally got it!" said Malesker, "What a thrill!"
Melissa Carlo/Winona Daily News
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More than anything, it is her wish to ride in a car like this before she dies.
“Who wants to go for a ride?” asked Tom Thorson.
Tom owns Valley Motors in Winona. Perhaps you’ve seen his ‘55 Ford Sunliner. He loans it out for parades and weddings. But never has the car been used to fulfill a dying woman’s last wish.
Last week, he got a call from Ardys’ daughter Kim Carmona.
“You wouldn’t believe what I went through to set this up,” Kim said.
Kim searched for a pink convertible for weeks, after she overheard her mother mention the wish to a granddaughter. She called several dealerships with no luck. She tried the technical college. Finally, she heard about Tom’s Sunliner. He was more than willing to help.
On Thursday morning, Kim convinced Ardys to take a shopping trip. Another daughter, Bonnie Malesker, drove Ardys to Valley Motors instead.
Ardys looked confused as she stepped out of the car and looked around the lot.
That’s when Tom open the garage door to reveal the cherished pink convertible.
Smiling ear to ear, Ardys slid across the pink seat. Tom turned the key, slid the car into drive and they were off. Ardys’ family stayed behind.
First stop was Lakeview Drive Inn, where they sipped rootbeer. Later, Tom chauffeured Ardys by the levee, Lake Winona and Prairie Island.
As the car rolled back into the lot, Ardys’ family snapped photos. Ardys waved and smiled. Her family seemed at peace.
“Accepting (my cancer) was the hardest thing,” Ardys said after the drive. “But I always knew I had a great family.”
redbaron wrote on Jul 3, 2009 12:57 PM: