"Yeah, I'm just taking notes."

It's called "the annual company mammogram." Sounds like "the annual company picnic." But much easier. I didn't even have to leave the building.

The idea is to encourage early detection, for employees and their families. Cancer that hasn't spread beyond the breast can mean lumpectomy, not mastectomy. Removing only the tumor, not the whole breast. And maybe only radiation, not chemotherapy.

I'd actually thought about getting my first mammogram the previous year, but never got around to it. I decided this time there really was no excuse. I was a little younger than the usual age - 35 or 40 - for first mammograms. But my risk, statistically, was greater: My mother had gotten breast cancer 30 years earlier.

A few days after the company mammogram came a call: Could I go in for a magnified mammogram? Sure. I didn't give it much thought.

But my eyes watered a bit after that call from Dr. Heilbrunn. Then came the referral to Dr. Rick Clarfeld, a surgeon who specializes in breast disease. An in-office needle biopsy produced "suspicious" results. He ordered the full-fledged biopsy.

Dec. 27, 1990. Biopsy day. Waiting with my friend Torben in the PolyClinic surgery center. I pick up that morning's USA Today. Headline: "Epidemic of breast cancer hitting women."

A couple hours later, I was one of the 175,000 women in the U.S. diagnosed in 1990 with breast cancer.

I'd prepared myself for the worst. Which I usually do, biopsy or Seahawks game. So it wasn't a shock. Not even when Dr. Clarfeld suggested the possibility of having a double mastectomy, to prevent the cancer from spreading to the other breast.

The hardest part of the day was telling my mother.

I was her "baby," the youngest of six. We'd grown even more close in the past few years, as my dad's health deteriorated. I dreaded breaking the news to her.

She wasn't there when Torben and I arrived at her house in the Ravenna neighborhood. I felt like chickening out: We could go home and call her later, I said. Torben was gentle but firm: We should wait and tell her in person.

I knew he was right. In the seven years we'd been together, he was usually right about such things. Which was fine with me.

Torben and I shared so many things, from ball playing to Buddhist teachings to Indian food. We also shared respect for each other's strengths: maybe my organizational skills and spicy cooking; certainly his kindness, patience and flexibility. Like telling me later that it was OK if the strain of the coming months would make me grumpy; and OK if I didn't do my usual chores around our apartment.

And I appreciated him thinking of my mother at a time like this.

My mom finally got home after almost two hours. We three sat down in the living room like any visit. She started telling us where she'd been, what she'd been doing. When she stopped, I said we'd come from the PolyClinic, where I'd had a breast biopsy, and it was positive.

Silence.