Commercial Appeal, Tuesday, January 6, 2004

Shane Battier. Lorenzen Wright. Pau Gasol.

The stars of the Memphis Grizzlies basketball team are virtually household names.

Kenny Dunn, Aaron Echols and Luseana Pese?

I'll bet you've never heard of them.

But the struggles of these young patients at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital are more arduous than, as Battier quipped Monday, guarding the L.A. Lakers' Shaquille O'Neal.

The Grizzlies' players and these courageous children met on a chilly morning, as the team and St. Jude opened the $10 million Memphis Grizzlies House on the hospital's campus downtown.

In a tent next to the five-story house were the usual dignitaries, the expected pontificating and polite applause to praise the team's $5 million gift toward the house's construction.

And way in the back, too far away to see the stage, was 14-year-old Brandon Six.

Brandon and his parents, John and Betty, were one of 41 families who moved into the Grizzlies House on Sunday.

For 13 years, the Six family has made the nearly seven-hour trek from their home in Chapin, Ill., to St. Jude.

As an infant, Brandon was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor.

Without treatment, the doctors gave him three months to live.

With treatment, he'd live another year.

"They gave us really no hope," Betty Six says.

But after 13 years of treatment, two brain surgeries, chemotherapy and 60 doses of radiation, Brandon is cancer-free. While Brandon was a patient, his parents stayed in hotels paid for by St. Jude.

One downtown hotel wasn't too safe. At another, their van was stolen.

But the Grizzlies House? Just right.

With hardwood floors, a microwave, sink and refrigerator, the suite is divided into two rooms, each with its own TV and DVD player.

The front room has a pullout sofa and a small kitchen table. The back room has two double beds, and from the fifth-floor window, the Six family can see the statue of St. Jude, patron saint of lost causes.

Brandon isn't battling cancer any more, but the radiation damaged his thyroid, stunted his growth and caused cataracts.

So three or four times a year, the family returns, so Brandon can see nearly a half-dozen specialists who try to keep the teen healthy.

But instead of staying in hotels with druggies, bugs and burglars, the Sixes will come to the Grizzlies House.

The new building can hold up to 100 families who need a home for a week or less while their children are patients at St. Jude.

With the Grizzlies House, the Ronald McDonald House for short-term stays and the Target House for long-term stays, housing for St. Jude families is complete, said Dick Shadyac, national executive director of the American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities, the fund-raising arm of St. Jude.

There's room at the three houses for up to 247 families.

"Now, our children won't have to stay in any more hotels."