Life is throwing overhand these days

Well, there’s news, bad news, and really bad news.

The “news” is I finally got canned from Brookhaven. July 11 was my last day. I took a week off, did some errands, took a trip to Vermont to visit Margaret and returned to start my new/old career back writing for the Times Review Newspapers on Monday July 21. I’m now a “freelancer,” or itinerant journalist, and will spend most of my time writing for Denise Civiletti and the Suffolk Times/Riverhead News Review/Shelter Island Reporter and the wonderful North Shore Sun. I’ll focus on the environment and real estate, two favorite topics. The money’s not like it was in town government, but with Dolores’s support we can manage. And it’s what I want to do. (And can, but only thanks to her!!)

More on my Vermont trip and amateur pro wrestling (yes) in an upcoming entry.

Now for the bad news: my friend and former co-worker Mike Pitcher has been in the hospital for near a week. Tests seem inconclusive (he’s got one more to go) and he’ll be out on Thursday, 7/31, not too much the worse for wear. That's actually good news. Also, another coworker has been in hospital but he too is getting sprung soon, although I’m not sure they really know what’s wrong with him, either. Which isn't really bad news, but not exactly good news.

Now for the really bad news – a friend and former Severna Park, MD neighbor, Ted Paquet, was killed in an auto accident in Maryland just as I was leaving for Vermont. Dolores went down and said it was heart-wrenching. No need for details, just know he was too young to die, had too much to live for, and his kids don’t deserve what happened.

If that wasn’t enough, another dear friend, Kathy Meade, a co-worker and drinking buddy from Brookhaven town government, suffered a catastrophic medical mishap in a doctor’s office and is paralyzed from the neck down. There’s no telling at this stage how this will turn out, but if anyone reading this prays, pray for her, her husband Jim, and the friends who are standing by her like lionesses defending the pride. These are awesome women. Kathy's got great friends and deserves them.

No long philosophical “what does it all mean” from me tonight. Just that when real life intrudes into the fairy-castle-in-the-clouds worlds we sometimes build for ourselves, the descent is violent and the landing hard.

Visit Kathy in her hospital bed and all the stupid antics of the town republicans become so trivial, and the people who play their silly little games become so marginal, that you don’t know whether to laugh at their foolishness or simply dismiss them as trivial beyond consideration.

Watch how Kathy’s friends suffer as she struggles; and then consider all the time and energy wasted on the politics of greed.

Then watch how the nurses, docs, social workers, aides, ward clerks, everyone, in fact, on 18 South at Stony Brook University Medical Center works miracles by the minute, and they hardly even know they're doing it....just rearranging some pillows is a magnificent act of mercy, while working for 8 hours straight to get a new doc for a second opinion is an heroic accomplishment, worthy of great praise and gratitude.

Be uplifted these people have no interest in who controls the public information office, who reports to the town council, or who gets the credit for taking a few cars away from a few employees to save a few dollars. Those people in the white or blue or green scrubs know the consequences of their actions, and they are deliberate in what they do, what sort of power they have and how they wield it...and how they can be humbled by their inability to heal, and the tyranny of a broken body that cannot be cured with all the skill, compassion and technology at their command. If only those who live the illusion of being powerful understood what powerlessness really is, the consequences of what they do and how much hurt they cause, perhaps a little corner of Long Island would be a better place to live.

Please, pray for Kathy, pray hard.