from ENVISION Magazine, 2006
By Barbro McGuinn
After her children were grown, Joann Miller decided she wanted a new job. But while pounding the pavement, she said, “nothing really interested me.”
She recalls coming home from yet another frustrating job interview; her husband, Robert “Buck” Miller, took one look at her and said, “Go to school.”
She applied at UW-Whitewater, was accepted, and three years later graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor of science degree in political science – and an unwavering resolve to attend law school.
Starting at Marquette University law school in fall 2002, Joann said her first year commuting to Milwaukee every day was hectic, and it only got more so when she was hired in May 2003 as a law clerk at Krek & Associates S.C. in Jefferson; however, she persevered, encouraged every step of the way by her husband.
In May 2004, Buck had some back pain and went to the doctor. Nothing in the world prepared them to hear the words “bone cancer.” After a barrage of tests and other procedures, the Millers learned that he had multiple myeloma with spots on his spine, hip and skull. “That’s it. I’m done with law school,” Joann said. Knowing what lay ahead she wanted to be there for her husband every step of the way.
But Buck wouldn’t hear of it. “He insisted that everything would be fine,” Joann recalled. “He said he would be OK, and he would be here to see me sworn in.”
So the straight A student, with the help of her daughter, was able to keep going – and so did her husband. Defying even the doctor’s prediction on Nov. 14, 2004, that he would not live through the weekend, Buck hung on. He had promised his wife that he would live to see her sworn in as a lawyer.
And so it went until Friday, April 29, when, at her husband’s bedside, the oncologist told them there was nothing more they could do. He was too weak to endure a stem cell transplant, and any more chemotherapy would kill him.
“How long?” Joann asked. The doctor told her two weeks, three at most.
Her mind racing, she stepped up her plan to graduate early. “Buck had told me that he would be there when I was sworn in. I knew I had to do whatever I needed to do to pass my classes and graduate.”
She talked to her boss, attorney Ray Krek, who said it was time to “call in some favors – to write some letters” to help find a way for Joann to graduate early. She contacted her professors and law school assistant dean Bonnie Thompson and asked them, “What do I need to do and get a ‘C’ and graduate?”
Moving Buck home with the help of hospice, Joann said she sat up most nights. While Buck slept, she wrote papers, and one by one sent them to be graded. By May 11, 2005, she had fulfilled the requirements and she graduated.
Meanwhile, Krek arranged for Wisconsin Supreme Court Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson to come to the Millers’ home on May 13, to swear in Joann. Krek and his wife, Gayle, planned a party afterward, and Buck “called everyone” to invite them to the celebration.
On the morning of May 13, family and friends gathered around his bed for a “very – extremely emotional ceremony,” Joann recalled. “Buck was so alert, so together. He was doing well that day – it was fantastic.” Buck died one week later, on May 20.
“I now realize that he used every bit of strength he had left that day,” Joann said. He had fulfilled his promise to his wife. He had lived long enough to see her realize her dream.
Joann returned to work at Krek & Associates “right away. I was out of the office from March until mid-May, and then within a week I was a lawyer – and a widow.”
“I would not have done it if he had not been behind me, pushing me,” Joann said. “He gave me the self-confidence to do it. It was the biggest gift he could have given me - my education, knowing that I could take care of myself.”