Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
I'm a bitch I'm a lover
I'm a child I'm a mother
I'm a sinner I'm a saint
I do not feel ashamed
I'm your hell I'm your dream
I'm nothing in between
You know, you wouldn't want it any other way~~~"I'm A Bitch I'm A Lover"; Alanis Morissette
I truly don't even know where to start with this one. The thoughts and the memories having to do with events would have the most gifted Skinner Psychoanalyst have their heads spinning. One of the things that September would represent for me, was the cut-off-month of my TRIAL WORK PERIOD(TWP), with the Social Security Administration. The TWP is the nine-month free-for-all, if-you-will, that the SSA allows for those on a benefit program, to work and not suffer any conflicts with their benefits. For those nine months one is pretty much given a blank-check on income accrual. However, at the end of the ninth month, the microscopes and the abacus is brought out and placed on the table. In knowing all of this, I attempt to arrange in the middle of September, to make an appointment with the local SSA office. With the wheels of bureaucracy being what they are, not well-greased, the appointment isn't actually effected until Tuesday 11 October 2011; not good. I do not want to do anything that will put my SSDI in jeopardy to be discontinued. Realizing that getting the Powers-to-Be to be able to sit down with me at the ECBOE, and effect the details of what has to be done to avert a discontinuation of my benefits, will be a tall order.
Even in the lengthy month of this October, I know I am going to have take some unilateral surreptitious actions to dodge this TWP cut-off bullet. The cut-off on a monthly basis is $1000.00. And October, as Fate would have it, is like the longest October in 823 years!! Based on my rate-of-pay @ 20hrs/wk~~~I am IN TROUBLE. In the long term, I need to get my rate-of-pay reduced. I don't want to have the hours-per-week reduced because that will have a counter-productive effect on my family-coverage health-insurance plan. Getting the rate-of-pay reduced, will take weeks---so this is what I started doing, even before my meeting with Paul B. of the SSA did actually take place.
Starting Monday 10 October 2011, and following every week throughout the rest of October, I did as shown: Monday and Wednesday(full-time days), I would punch-in at 08:30AM. Then for lunch, I would punch-out for 13:00PM. When I came back from lunch, I wouldn't punch in. Then, when I left for those days, I never punched-out.
On my Thursday part-time-day, while I was in there for four and one-half hours working, I NEVER punched-in, or punched-out. Total paid work-hours for the week=EIGHT. Because I do not want any nail-biter situation with the SSA, I followed this pattern every week throughout the remainder of October.
The pressure-release-valve development that did materialize from a mid-October meeting with the commissioner of the ECBOE, was that in the third week of October I received word that my rate-of-pay was reduced. The reduction that is now in effect, is such that I should be able to punch the clock for all of the hours I work, hold onto the family health insurance plan, and most importantly, hold onto the bedrock of our household income, my SSDI.
The whole experience with the SSA has been fraught with anxiety. It is an income that I have been paying into, all of my life, but the administration overseeing the funds, treat you as if you are doing something scandalous in seeking and having these monies. This would included the period of time when I was drawing a stipend from AmeriCorps Buffalo when I was doing the volunteer work @ The Belle Center. It is my prayer that this recent development with the rate-of-pay modification will finally give me some peace-of-mind---at least in this segment of my life.
Wednesday 12 October 2011, was a DC current---kind of evening!! It was new, it was challenging, and it was interesting!! Slated in the evening was this pivotal fund-raiser for the Erie County Executive Democratic candidate Mark Poloncarz. It was to take place at The Colter Bay on Delaware Ave in downtown Buffalo, NY. While this was a favorite watering-hole for Robert Preneta a very good boss from my Barnett Brass days, I had never been in this place myself. While it was raining, and challenging, it was as well, appealing. There were lots of people. That can be an asset, as well as a liability. Some people I recognized; others I did not. Thank God for lots of people. For starts---I had to get myself, and my scooter, out of the rain!! Initially, I had to have myself and my scooter ascend two crescent-shaped steps---and then a door threshold to get into the place. And i will add---with no hand-rails present and accounted for. What was sweet was that there were these three guys and these 2 women who just came out---like guardian angels, to help. Between getting the door, keeping me stable as I walker-wrangled and was shoulder-gripped up and through the entrance area, I was pleased to see my scooter was coming up right behind me~~~into Colter Bay!!
Once up and in, I am able to find a suitable staging area for SCOOTER & CO!! I was grateful for those whom stepped in to help, and I took the time to let them know that. Derrick S. was huge in running around getting food & drink for me. After some time it would be persons that I did not even know, who would offer to get me another drink or get me seconds on the banquet edibles. It was as if I was a quarterback calling a play-changing audible at the line-of-scrimmage; 12---19---26; hut, hut!! Somebody would be going wide-left for the food, and somebody would be going wide-right for the drinks!! But~~~wide-right was also going to be a huge undertaking later, when I would have to use the restroom. Typically, the restroom is in 'the-back'. This restroom, along with the restaurant, which is behind the lounge of Colter Bay, rests on a platform. Here again, a guardian-angel of a slighter-framed woman, whom I did not know from Adam, stepped up to the plate to run interference through the crowd for me and my scooter. Once at the platform, she helped me ascend that too, with my walker now in hand. She continued to stay with me with my walker in hand, to make sure I got into the restroom without any problems. And I must admit, it helped my ego immensely as she repeated more than a couple of times that I must possess incredible upper-body-strength.
Once the restroom break was effected, it was getting back to the lounge, and back to conversations. in due course of time the fundraising activity ceased and the crowd, thank God, did begin to thin out. The conversations were by-and-large small talk but a tid-bit from this one woman from City-Hall needs to be entered into this journal. I feel so because the juxtaposition constitutes a parallel-world coincidence. As all adults do, at some point pridefully, children are brought up in conversation. As this woman is providing a chronicle of her children, she comes to mentioning ELEKTRA. I gasped, and did an immediate~~~O M G!! The dramatic reaction was the result of the twist of Fate. It was just the day previous, Tuesday 11 October I was having this discussion about music groups in the 60's that had songs devoted to dance-sensations of the era. And one of my offerings in the discussion had to do with the "Freddie," and a local group that had gained some notoriety with this production effort. I had suggested that the local group name was either the INVICTAS, or the ELECTRAS. The next day, I'm discovering that Elektra is one of the daughters of this woman!!
Eventually, I had to leave. And yes, it is still raining outside. I must reflect as an anecdote. Maybe it is just that people, good Samaritans if you will, just help because they realize that they in short, can just walk away. I find it confounding though how people who don't even know me from Adam---just JUMP-IN and help. I don't see that at all, the closer to home that I get. As a matter-of-fact, by the time the documentary film director has his cameras zoomed to the master bedroom, one will observe that bed-side-manners---are non-existent.
As I am leaving, a bit of an entourage formulates around me as I walker my way to the door. While the City-Hall woman anchors the door to allow me to grip the handle and "work" the walker with my left-hand, this other woman grabs my left upper arm saying that she will help---her father has 'problems', too.
Once down the stairs, these two guys Greg and James carry my scooter out to me. Then they decide, in the rain, that they are going to make sure I get to my van without incident. I assured them that I "do-this-all-the-time". Lynn again repeats that she has to help her father and therefore is staying with me. So along comes Greg & James. It is a long wet walk from Allen St. to Virginia St. along Delaware Ave. When we get to my van and open the rear gate, I in due course of time take grip of the control-box that has the allows the ramp to hydraulically come out of the back. Lynn removes the control-box from my hand, assuring that she must help; that she does this all the time for her dad. I acquiesce. I mean---everybody is getting wet, so I am not going to argue. Once the scooter is up and in, I profusely thank all three and make my way into the vehicle. And of course, this just wows them!! This is because I have to do that 'power-lift' of my body---to get in.
For an evening that had me interacting with so many different people, and so many of these were for the first time, I felt while driving home, a---Rhapsody In The Rain!!
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Sunday, November 6, 2011
An October To Remember Part IA
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
All alone am I ever since your goodbye
All alone with just a beat of my heart
People all around but I don't hear a sound
Just the lonely beating of my heart~~~Brenda Lee - All Alone Am I
Bishop Fallon High School
Hall of Fame Dinner~~~
Enjoy the summary!!!
28 October 2011
Bishop Fallon High School HALL of FAME Dinner
is celebrated at Salvatore's Italian Gardens.
When Frank Longo, one of the inductees of this year's Bishop Fallon High School's HALL of FAME Dinner held Friday 28 October 2011, at Salvatore's Italian Gardens, was at the podium making his remarks, at one point he became reflective. He was revealing to those in attendance a conversation he was having with his wife as they were getting themselves ready for the evening's festivities. He found himself pondering aloud; "Honey, did you ever wonder how, in your wildest dreams, that I would have accomplished something like this!?!?!?" To which Frank's wife deadpans; :Longo, you are NOT IN my wildest dreams!!"
Needless to say, everybody had a good laugh~~~and an accompanying applause, to that one.
The other inductees included Ralph Cammarata(posthumously) 1945, Clement Eckert 1952, Charles Tedesco 1959, Father James Fee 62, and Tony Diina 1965. The two inductees, in particular, that I was focused on because they had relevance to me was: Joseph Grifasi 1962, and Paul J LoVello 1967.
Paul LoVello was the anchor of the 1967 Varsity Baseball team. It was important for me to converse with him singularly about some of other players that were part of that varsity squad. They were part of my graduating class of 1969. Included on that roster was 2010 Hall of Fame inductee JImmy Scime, as well as Gary Porter and Kevin Nellany. He was very appreciative of the connection that I reminisced about.
Joseph Grifasi was the 'interesting' selection, this year. Which is probably why they saved him as the last appearance to the podium. He must have been a "card" in grade school at Annunciation, as well as Bishop Fallon, because he was a 'cut-up' on the dais. He had us laughing, with every one of his sentimental one-liners. It was very important for me to introduce myself to Joseph because of the two-pronged connection of Bishop Fallon High School & Annunciation Grade School. In one of his 'imparts', he starts talking about Father O'Leary~~~and 120 Congress Street. My mind is now like an M-80 whose fuse is lit: I'm thinking: it has to be?!?!?
When the festivities are finally concluded, I made my way over to Joseph & some of his other family members. Sure enough!! Joseph Grifasi, and his sister Carol, who was in attendance, are the older siblings to Susan Grifasi, whom I graduated with in 1965, at Annunciation Grade School!! The great-niece of Susan then took some pictures of Carol, myself, and Joseph. We continued the conversation as we reconnected in the lounge area, mentioning a number of Susan's other classmates. He recalled many of the names that I mentioned because he added that they would often be at the Grifasi House , after school. While in the lounge, where there were NO televisions, I was grateful to have gotten a phone call from my son Philip. God bless him; he checks in with me every now and again. We have a number of things in common including the love of baseball. He called to let me know that there was INSANITY in St. Louis, MO!!! The Cardinals are this year's Cinderella sports-story, winning the World Series against the favored Texas Rangers. This truly was a Golden Friday!!
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
All alone am I ever since your goodbye
All alone with just a beat of my heart
People all around but I don't hear a sound
Just the lonely beating of my heart~~~Brenda Lee - All Alone Am I
Bishop Fallon High School
Hall of Fame Dinner~~~
Enjoy the summary!!!
28 October 2011
Bishop Fallon High School HALL of FAME Dinner
is celebrated at Salvatore's Italian Gardens.
When Frank Longo, one of the inductees of this year's Bishop Fallon High School's HALL of FAME Dinner held Friday 28 October 2011, at Salvatore's Italian Gardens, was at the podium making his remarks, at one point he became reflective. He was revealing to those in attendance a conversation he was having with his wife as they were getting themselves ready for the evening's festivities. He found himself pondering aloud; "Honey, did you ever wonder how, in your wildest dreams, that I would have accomplished something like this!?!?!?" To which Frank's wife deadpans; :Longo, you are NOT IN my wildest dreams!!"
Needless to say, everybody had a good laugh~~~and an accompanying applause, to that one.
The other inductees included Ralph Cammarata(posthumously) 1945, Clement Eckert 1952, Charles Tedesco 1959, Father James Fee 62, and Tony Diina 1965. The two inductees, in particular, that I was focused on because they had relevance to me was: Joseph Grifasi 1962, and Paul J LoVello 1967.
Paul LoVello was the anchor of the 1967 Varsity Baseball team. It was important for me to converse with him singularly about some of other players that were part of that varsity squad. They were part of my graduating class of 1969. Included on that roster was 2010 Hall of Fame inductee JImmy Scime, as well as Gary Porter and Kevin Nellany. He was very appreciative of the connection that I reminisced about.
Joseph Grifasi was the 'interesting' selection, this year. Which is probably why they saved him as the last appearance to the podium. He must have been a "card" in grade school at Annunciation, as well as Bishop Fallon, because he was a 'cut-up' on the dais. He had us laughing, with every one of his sentimental one-liners. It was very important for me to introduce myself to Joseph because of the two-pronged connection of Bishop Fallon High School & Annunciation Grade School. In one of his 'imparts', he starts talking about Father O'Leary~~~and 120 Congress Street. My mind is now like an M-80 whose fuse is lit: I'm thinking: it has to be?!?!?
When the festivities are finally concluded, I made my way over to Joseph & some of his other family members. Sure enough!! Joseph Grifasi, and his sister Carol, who was in attendance, are the older siblings to Susan Grifasi, whom I graduated with in 1965, at Annunciation Grade School!! The great-niece of Susan then took some pictures of Carol, myself, and Joseph. We continued the conversation as we reconnected in the lounge area, mentioning a number of Susan's other classmates. He recalled many of the names that I mentioned because he added that they would often be at the Grifasi House , after school. While in the lounge, where there were NO televisions, I was grateful to have gotten a phone call from my son Philip. God bless him; he checks in with me every now and again. We have a number of things in common including the love of baseball. He called to let me know that there was INSANITY in St. Louis, MO!!! The Cardinals are this year's Cinderella sports-story, winning the World Series against the favored Texas Rangers. This truly was a Golden Friday!!
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Saturday, November 5, 2011
An October to Remember~~~Part II
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
In restless dreams I walked alone, narrow streets of cobblestone
Neath the halo of a streetlamp, I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light, split the night
And touched the sound of silence~~~Simon & Garfunkel; The Sound of Silence
St. Louis is near the epicenter of this Great Country. On 28 October 2011 it was Friday Night Lights!!! ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE COMPLETION OF THE GATEWAY ARCHES did transpire the GREATEST WORLD SERIES since the 1975 World Series between the Cincinnati Reds and the Boston Red Sox. On a day that in effect constituted the first Double-Header in World Series history, Cinderella was presented her glass slipper!! The drama that lead up to the Cardinals winning this WORLD SERIES would have Bench/Fisk & Co's theatrics, pale by comparison. Freese-Frame's Gateway Arched home run to center field in Game-Six at 12:39AM EST of Friday, is truly one of MLB's ICONIC MOMENTS!! As David Freese was finished rounding-the-bases of his dramatic 11th inning home run, his team-mates came onto the field and starting tearing his attire off of him. Observers were to wonder if his teammates were going to "lay him bare" on the diamond!!
Below is an Associated Press reporter's account of Game Six:
Cards Come Up Trumps
BEN WALKER
ST. LOUIS— The Associated Press
Published Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 12:48AM EDT
Last updated Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 10:35AM EDT
Twice down to their last strike, the St. Louis Cardinals kept rallying to win one of baseball's greatest thrillers.
David Freese completed a startling night of comebacks with a home run leading off the bottom of the 11th inning to beat Texas 10-9 on Thursday, and suddenly fans all over got something they have waited a long time to see: Game 7 in the World Series.“You had to be here to believe it,” Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said.
It was as great a game as baseball has ever witnessed, rivaling the Carlton Fisk homer in Game 6 of the 1975 Series and Bill Buckner's error in Game 6 of the 1986 Series.
Great, that is, except for Texas. The Rangers were that close to their first championship.
“I understand it's not over till you get that last out,” Texas manager Ron Washington said. “I was just sitting there praying we got that last out. We didn't get it.”
Next up on Friday night, the first Game 7 in the World Series since the Angels beat San Francisco in 2002.
Freese, the hometown boy who made good, had already written himself into St. Louis lore in Game 6 with a two-strike, two-out, two-run triple in the ninth off Rangers closer Neftali Feliz that made it 7-all.
“Initially I was like 'Are you kidding me? My first AB off Feliz in this situation ever,'“ Freese said. “I just beared down, got a pitch to hit. Initially I thought I hit it pretty good, I thought (right fielder Nelson Cruz) was going to grab it, so just a lot of emotions on that one.”
After banged-up Josh Hamilton hit a two-run homer in the Texas 10th, St. Louis again tied it when Lance Berkman hit a two-out single on a 2-2 pitch from Scott Feldman.
Busch Stadium was still in frenzy when Freese opened the 11th with a leadoff shot over the center field wall off Mark Lowe. Freese thrust his arm in the air as he rounded first base, and the crowd was delirious.
“Just an incredible feeling, seeing all my teammates at the dish waiting for me,” said Freese, whose shirt was torn off during the celebration.
A night that started off terribly for both teams turned terrific for everyone watching.
After it was over, La Russa wasn't willing to announce his starter for Game 7 — many believe it will be ace Chris Carpenter on three days' rest. Matt Harrison is set to start for Texas.
Home teams have won the last eight Game 7s in the World Series, a streak that started with the Cardinals beating Milwaukee in 1982.
Texas trudged off the field as Freese circled the bases after connecting off Lowe, having been so close to that elusive title. Much earlier, team president Nolan Ryan was high-fiving friends in the stands as Adrian Beltre and Nelson Cruz opened the seventh with home runs that helped Texas take a 7-4 lead.
Allen Craig's solo homer in the eighth began the Cardinals' comeback. Jake Westbrook wound up with the win.
Hardly the ending anyone imagined in a game that started out with a bevy of errors and bobbles — none more surprising than the routine popup that Freese simply dropped at third base.
“I'm just glad I had a chance after I looked like an idiot on that popup,” Freese said.
The Cardinals made it 4-all in the sixth when Alexi Ogando relieved starter Colby Lewis and walked Yadier Molina with the bases loaded.
Then came a key play — Napoli and Beltre teamed up to pick off Matt Holliday at third with the bases loaded.
With one out, Napoli zipped a throw to Beltre, who neatly used his cleat to block the diving Holliday from reaching the base. That also ended Holliday's night with a severely bruised right pinkie. Texas wasn't quite out of trouble as Nick Punto walked to reload the bases. But Derek Holland, the star of Game 4 with shutout ball into the ninth inning, trotted in from the bullpen and retired Jon Jay on a comebacker.
The Rangers looked loose as they took the field for pregame warmups. Cruz playfully kicked a couple of Cardinals gloves strewn on the grass, and smiled at his St. Louis pals.
Once they started, however, both Texas and St. Louis seemed tense, as if they were trying too hard with so much at stake. Either that, or they looked like they were playing in the sloppy weather that forced Wednesday night's postponement.
Exacerbated by the errors, the teams seesawed through the early innings.
Texas did more damage in three batters against Jaime Garcia than it did in seven scoreless innings against him in Game 2, with Hamilton hitting an RBI single in the first.
St. Louis came out swinging at first pitches, and Berkman's two-run homer into the center field bleachers made it 2-1 in the bottom half. Ian Kinsler tied it in the Texas second with an RBI double. Garcia was pulled after the third in his shortest outing since June 2010.
Shaky in the field all year, St. Louis made two errors in a span of four batters in the fourth behind reliever Fernando Salas, equaling its mistake total for the Series.
Holliday failed to take charge on an easy fly ball by Cruz and dropped it for a two-base error. Napoli followed with an opposite-field single to right that hit the chalk line for his 10th RBI of the Series. Salas then sailed Lewis' bunt into center and Napoli turned his left ankle as he went leg into the bag on the play. Napoli was checked, and was OK.
The misplays continued in the Cards fourth when first baseman Michael Young made an errant throw to Lewis covering the base, letting Berkman reach. Molina's RBI grounder made it 3-all.
The next botch belonged to St. Louis. Hamilton lifted a major league popup in the fifth that started foul, drifted fair and was dropped by Freese. Young took advantage with an RBI double for a 4-3 lead.
Notes: Texas was 0 for 11 with two outs and runners in scoring position in the Series until Kinsler's double. ... Berkman hit his first Series home run. He was moved up a spot to cleanup for this game. ... David Eckstein, MVP of the 2006 Series for St. Louis, threw out the first ball. ... 90-year-old Hall of Famer Stan Musial rode in on a golf cart during pregame festivities. ... The crowd of 47,325 was a record for 6-year-old Busch Stadium.
From the CRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR!!! If the CSM is writing about the World Series, you know this has to be~~~extraordinary!!
World Series history: Cardinals over Texas Rangers in 11 is instant classic
Twice the Texas Rangers were within an out of winning the World Series. But the Cardinals came back in dramatic fashion, and David Freese's walk-off in the 11th grabbed a bit of history. There's a new rival for the title of most thrilling Game 6 in World Series history, and new rival for the title of hero.
At the very least, the 11-inning win by the St. Louis Cardinals is an instant classic, one that enters the top tier of postseason epics.
The game twice took the Texas Rangers within one strike of a world championship. It took fans of both teams on an emotional roller coaster. And it is taking the bat and the shredded jersey of David Freese, who homered to win the game and keep Cardinal hopes alive for a Game 7, to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
It was baseball at its white-knuckle, goose-bump finest.
Part comedy of errors, part battle of managerial wits, and no small part a show of performance under pressure.
A recap of the drama: The teams battled to a 4-4 tie by the dawn of the seventh inning, when the Rangers mustered three-run rally. The Cardinals appeared all but doomed when they closed out the eighth inning still two runs down, missing a bases-loaded opportunity.
All the Rangers had to do was have their closer, Neftali Feliz, get three more outs. The first Rangers title ever would be theirs. And Feliz almost accomplished the job. But in the ninth, with two outs and two men on base, Freese tripled to tie the game and send it into extra innings. The Rangers answered with two runs in the top of the 10th.
Again, in the bottom of the inning, the Cardinals came down to their last out. Berkman's single to center field evened up the game yet again, paving the way for an 11th inning after both teams had already worked through most of their available pitchers.
Freese's walk-off home run in the bottom of the inning finished the game. As he struggled to touch home plate amid a swarm of team-mates (one of whom ripped his jersey apart), two things were clear to anybody watching. There would need to be a decisive Game 7. And wow, what a game that was.
So where should this game rest in the baseball pantheon?
Certainly it's up there on a top-hits list, when it comes to multi-act drama in a potentially decisive World Series game. (This wasn't a one-man or one-team show of force, like Don Larsen pitching a perfect game midway through the 1956 World Series.)
That said, let's admit that in baseball's long history, there have been more than a handful of remarkable games that ended or nearly ended the championship series.
It's hard to argue that this one tops the best Game 7s, such as those of 1960 (with Bill Mazeroski's home run for Pittsburgh), 1991 (with Jack Morris's 10-inning shutout for Minnesota), or 1924 (a 12-inning epic). Fans of the game could toss in a number of other favorites.
And what about Carlton Fisk? His 12th-inning home run for the Red Sox in 1975 was another instance of a team fending off doom – in this case the threat that the "Big Red Machine" of Cincinnati would win the Series that night. The Boston catcher famously waved the ball fair, as it veered toward the left-field foul pole in Fenway Park.
To Boston fans and many others, that was unforgettable. To many baseball fans today, Freese's shot holds a candle to it.
The Cardinals' win represents just the third time that a team one out from elimination in the World Series came back to win the game, the Associated Press reports, citing STATS LLC. The New York Mets did it in 1986 (and won the championship in the next game), and the New York Giants did it in 1911, but ended up losing the series.
Indeed, the comparison with Game Six in 1975 reinforces the reminder: The winner of a legendary game isn't always the winner of the Series. The Sox lost to the Reds back then. It remains to be seen what will happen in Game 7 between the Cardinals and Rangers Friday night.
If the Cardinals win, the prominence of this Game 6 will ratchet a notch higher.
The Deciding Game Seven account~~~below, from The Sporting News:
ST. LOUIS—At some point when the Cardinals, their families and friends were romping around Busch Stadium Friday night, Lance Berkman pulled Albert Pujols aside and pleaded, "Come back. Let's do this again."
Though Pujols would not commit, Berkman could not have picked a better time to make his pitch.
The Cardinals had just won Game 7 of the World Series, 6-2 over the Rangers to complete perhaps the most incredible stretch in baseball history.
In the past two months, the Cardinals overcame a 10 1/2-game deficit in the playoff race to win the franchise's 11th World Series championship.
So what did Pujols tell his teammate?
"The same thing I'm going to tell you," Pujols said. "Whatever decision I make is hopefully the best decision for my family and the fans and everybody. To talk about my contract right now is the last thing I'm thinking about. I'm just going to enjoy the moment."
Give the man that much. As he sat at the interview podium with son A.J. along with Chris Carpenter and his two children, Pujols had many moments to soak in.
David Freese was named the World Series MVP. (AP Photo)
There was the late-August players' only meeting that fueled a 22-9 surge that led to clinching the NL wild card on the season's final day.
There was the Game 2 rally from a 4-0 deficit against Cliff Lee and the Phillies and Carpenter's 1-0 masterpiece against Roy Halladay that sent the Cardinals to the NLCS.
There were Pujols' four extra-base hit performance in the NLCS, and his three-homer, five-hit record night in Game 3 of the World Series.
There were nightly hitting heroics from World Series MVP David Freese and Allen Craig, and shutdown performances from the bullpen throughout the NLCS.
And don't forget the comeback of all comebacks in Game 6 of the World Series, when the Cardinals twice were within one strike of being finished, but pulled out a 10-9, 11-inning victory.
"This is what you dream about," manager Tony La Russa said. "It's hard to really imagine it actually happened."
Steering the journey were the two veterans in the interview room, Pujols and Carpenter.
They were among a handful of Cardinals around for the 2006 championship who took extra pleasure in helping all the newcomers become a part of Cardinals' history. This club has some history, too, with its 11 championships second only to the Yankees' 27.
There were plenty of newcomers able to celebrate their first championship, from Berkman to Matt Holliday to Octavio Dotel, Rafael Furcal and 20-year veteran Arthur Rhodes. "To have the opportunity to experience that, with guys that haven't experienced this before that have been around a long time is amazing," Carpenter said.
After years of competing against the Cardinals with the Astros, Berkman had to join the Cardinals to become a champion. The feeling, he said, surpassed his expectations. "Way better," he said as he remained on the field long after the game had ended and the trophy presentation had concluded. "You can't imagine the exhilaration of finally winning, particular in the fashion that we did. It wasn't like we swept four games in four laughers. We had to fight this whole series, this whole postseason."
With as many young players as veterans contributing to the championship has owner Bill DeWitt looking forward to next year.
"The great thing about winning like this with young players is now they have now gone through it," DeWitt said. "They may not have played a lot of years in the big leagues but to have succeeded at this level is a great foundation of future success."
The only hitch, DeWitt sees is the Cardinals being in a new role in 2012. "I feel great about the young players we have. We've re-signed a lot of our veterans who are exceptional players. We feel great about our club in the future.
"We were the underdog in all these series," he said. "But I guess if you're the world champions, you won't be the underdogs."
The architect of the no-longer underdogs roster, GM John Mozeliak, was not quite ready to look at 2012. "We'll enjoy this for 72 hours and then we'll get going," he said.
All of baseball will be watching as the Cardinals try to retain Pujols. Winning a second championship makes it even more difficult to picture Pujols playing elsewhere.
"We never talked about it (during the season)," La Russa said. "Now it's time to start talking about it. The organization is going to try to keep him here and Albert wants to stay here, and best effort, we'll see if it comes off or not."
After this wild ride, seeing Pujols re-up might be the only way to have any more fun than they've had the past two months.
AND~~~From Sporting News as well:
ST. LOUIS— David Freese, the hometown boy made good, is the MVP of the World Series.
Down to their final strike in Game 6, the Cardinals' reluctant hero delivered a tying two-run triple in the ninth inning Thursday night. Freese then did one better: a leadoff homer in the 11th that gave St. Louis a dramatic win over the Rangers and forced the first Game 7 since 2002.
Freese, also the NL championship series MVP, capped his memorable October by hitting a two-run double in the first inning Friday night to tie the Texas Rangers at 2-all. He also drew a pair of walks that helped lead to runs, and the Cardinals held on for a 6-2 win and their 11th championship.
"This means everything," Freese said.
When the final out was made, Freese threw his arms in the air and dashed for the mound, where he joined a happy scrum as confetti floated down from the upper reaches of Busch Stadium.
"This is why you keep battling," Freese said. "Sometimes things don't work out, you get injured, you do stupid stuff, but you try to stay on path. You surround yourself with guys like we have on this team. I'm so glad to be part of this."
Freese batted .348 in the World Series, with seven RBIs, three doubles and one big homer. He's the fourth Cardinals player to win the MVP award, joining Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Gibson in 1964 and '67, catcher Darrell Porter in 1982 and David Eckstein in their 2006 victory over Detroit.
"You learn from all these veterans about how to go about this game," Freese said, "and I wouldn't be here without them."
Freese could just as well be the MVP of the entire postseason.
The kid who grew up in a St. Louis suburb hit a three-run homer in Game 6 of the NLCS against Milwaukee, the first act in his coming out party. His performance in Act 2 against the Rangers made him the sixth player to be MVP of a championship series and the World Series.
Often lost in a high-scoring lineup that includes Albert Pujols, Matt Holliday and Lance Berkman, Freese left his impression on baseball's grandest stage out of necessity.
Holliday struggled most of the series before spraining his right wrist during Game 6, taking him off the roster Friday. Pujols was intentionally walked whenever he was a threat.
That left the offense to Freese, who had given up on baseball after high school, spurning a scholarship offer from Missouri to simply be a college student. He even rebuffed the Tigers' coaches when they called midway through his first semester to find out whether he'd changed his mind.
It wasn't until about a year out of high school that the itch to play finally returned.
David Freese was named the 2011 World Series MVP. (AP Photo)
Freese gave in and enrolled at St. Louis Community College-Meremec, and his play there caught the attention of the coaching staff at South Alabama. Freese blossomed into the Padres' ninth-round draft pick in 2006, and a trade to the Cardinals eventually brought him home.
"If you wrote a story like that — a guy gets traded, comes back to his hometown, he's a hero — if you sent that in the script, it would get thrown back in your face," Commissioner Bud Selig said.
This wasn't a perfect fairy tale, though. That would be too easy.
Freese needed season-ending surgery to repair a torn tendon in his right ankle last year, and he broke his left hand when he was hit by a pitch earlier this season. He was hit by another pitch in August and sustained a concussion.
Each time, he came back better than before.
He was at his best against Texas.
In the World Series opener, with the game tied in the sixth inning, Freese delivered a timely double. He alertly moved to third base on a wild pitch, allowing him to score easily for the eventual winning run on Allen Craig's single to right field.
Freese scored the Cardinals' only run in a 2-1 loss in Game 2, and then drove in a pair of runs in a 16-7 victory in Game 3 — a performance that will be forever overshadowed by Pujols' three homers.
Nobody could overshadow Freese in Game 6.
After committing a critical error when an easy popup bounced out of his glove, Freese more than made up for it with his bat. Down to his final strike, his two-run triple in the ninth forced extra innings. In the 11th, he joined Bill Mazeroski, Carlton Fisk, Kirby Puckett and Joe Carter as the only players to hit a game-winning homer in Game 6 or later of a Fall Classic.
That's pretty select company.
Much like the company he'll enjoy as MVP of the World Series.
"I've had plenty of days in my life where I'd thought, you know, I wouldn't even be close to being a big leaguer," Freese said. "I'm here because of everyone around me. They put so much trust in me to accomplish, not just baseball, but stuff in life. To do this, I'm just full of joy.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
In restless dreams I walked alone, narrow streets of cobblestone
Neath the halo of a streetlamp, I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light, split the night
And touched the sound of silence~~~Simon & Garfunkel; The Sound of Silence
St. Louis is near the epicenter of this Great Country. On 28 October 2011 it was Friday Night Lights!!! ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE COMPLETION OF THE GATEWAY ARCHES did transpire the GREATEST WORLD SERIES since the 1975 World Series between the Cincinnati Reds and the Boston Red Sox. On a day that in effect constituted the first Double-Header in World Series history, Cinderella was presented her glass slipper!! The drama that lead up to the Cardinals winning this WORLD SERIES would have Bench/Fisk & Co's theatrics, pale by comparison. Freese-Frame's Gateway Arched home run to center field in Game-Six at 12:39AM EST of Friday, is truly one of MLB's ICONIC MOMENTS!! As David Freese was finished rounding-the-bases of his dramatic 11th inning home run, his team-mates came onto the field and starting tearing his attire off of him. Observers were to wonder if his teammates were going to "lay him bare" on the diamond!!
Below is an Associated Press reporter's account of Game Six:
Cards Come Up Trumps
BEN WALKER
ST. LOUIS— The Associated Press
Published Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 12:48AM EDT
Last updated Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 10:35AM EDT
Twice down to their last strike, the St. Louis Cardinals kept rallying to win one of baseball's greatest thrillers.
David Freese completed a startling night of comebacks with a home run leading off the bottom of the 11th inning to beat Texas 10-9 on Thursday, and suddenly fans all over got something they have waited a long time to see: Game 7 in the World Series.“You had to be here to believe it,” Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said.
It was as great a game as baseball has ever witnessed, rivaling the Carlton Fisk homer in Game 6 of the 1975 Series and Bill Buckner's error in Game 6 of the 1986 Series.
Great, that is, except for Texas. The Rangers were that close to their first championship.
“I understand it's not over till you get that last out,” Texas manager Ron Washington said. “I was just sitting there praying we got that last out. We didn't get it.”
Next up on Friday night, the first Game 7 in the World Series since the Angels beat San Francisco in 2002.
Freese, the hometown boy who made good, had already written himself into St. Louis lore in Game 6 with a two-strike, two-out, two-run triple in the ninth off Rangers closer Neftali Feliz that made it 7-all.
“Initially I was like 'Are you kidding me? My first AB off Feliz in this situation ever,'“ Freese said. “I just beared down, got a pitch to hit. Initially I thought I hit it pretty good, I thought (right fielder Nelson Cruz) was going to grab it, so just a lot of emotions on that one.”
After banged-up Josh Hamilton hit a two-run homer in the Texas 10th, St. Louis again tied it when Lance Berkman hit a two-out single on a 2-2 pitch from Scott Feldman.
Busch Stadium was still in frenzy when Freese opened the 11th with a leadoff shot over the center field wall off Mark Lowe. Freese thrust his arm in the air as he rounded first base, and the crowd was delirious.
“Just an incredible feeling, seeing all my teammates at the dish waiting for me,” said Freese, whose shirt was torn off during the celebration.
A night that started off terribly for both teams turned terrific for everyone watching.
After it was over, La Russa wasn't willing to announce his starter for Game 7 — many believe it will be ace Chris Carpenter on three days' rest. Matt Harrison is set to start for Texas.
Home teams have won the last eight Game 7s in the World Series, a streak that started with the Cardinals beating Milwaukee in 1982.
Texas trudged off the field as Freese circled the bases after connecting off Lowe, having been so close to that elusive title. Much earlier, team president Nolan Ryan was high-fiving friends in the stands as Adrian Beltre and Nelson Cruz opened the seventh with home runs that helped Texas take a 7-4 lead.
Allen Craig's solo homer in the eighth began the Cardinals' comeback. Jake Westbrook wound up with the win.
Hardly the ending anyone imagined in a game that started out with a bevy of errors and bobbles — none more surprising than the routine popup that Freese simply dropped at third base.
“I'm just glad I had a chance after I looked like an idiot on that popup,” Freese said.
The Cardinals made it 4-all in the sixth when Alexi Ogando relieved starter Colby Lewis and walked Yadier Molina with the bases loaded.
Then came a key play — Napoli and Beltre teamed up to pick off Matt Holliday at third with the bases loaded.
With one out, Napoli zipped a throw to Beltre, who neatly used his cleat to block the diving Holliday from reaching the base. That also ended Holliday's night with a severely bruised right pinkie. Texas wasn't quite out of trouble as Nick Punto walked to reload the bases. But Derek Holland, the star of Game 4 with shutout ball into the ninth inning, trotted in from the bullpen and retired Jon Jay on a comebacker.
The Rangers looked loose as they took the field for pregame warmups. Cruz playfully kicked a couple of Cardinals gloves strewn on the grass, and smiled at his St. Louis pals.
Once they started, however, both Texas and St. Louis seemed tense, as if they were trying too hard with so much at stake. Either that, or they looked like they were playing in the sloppy weather that forced Wednesday night's postponement.
Exacerbated by the errors, the teams seesawed through the early innings.
Texas did more damage in three batters against Jaime Garcia than it did in seven scoreless innings against him in Game 2, with Hamilton hitting an RBI single in the first.
St. Louis came out swinging at first pitches, and Berkman's two-run homer into the center field bleachers made it 2-1 in the bottom half. Ian Kinsler tied it in the Texas second with an RBI double. Garcia was pulled after the third in his shortest outing since June 2010.
Shaky in the field all year, St. Louis made two errors in a span of four batters in the fourth behind reliever Fernando Salas, equaling its mistake total for the Series.
Holliday failed to take charge on an easy fly ball by Cruz and dropped it for a two-base error. Napoli followed with an opposite-field single to right that hit the chalk line for his 10th RBI of the Series. Salas then sailed Lewis' bunt into center and Napoli turned his left ankle as he went leg into the bag on the play. Napoli was checked, and was OK.
The misplays continued in the Cards fourth when first baseman Michael Young made an errant throw to Lewis covering the base, letting Berkman reach. Molina's RBI grounder made it 3-all.
The next botch belonged to St. Louis. Hamilton lifted a major league popup in the fifth that started foul, drifted fair and was dropped by Freese. Young took advantage with an RBI double for a 4-3 lead.
Notes: Texas was 0 for 11 with two outs and runners in scoring position in the Series until Kinsler's double. ... Berkman hit his first Series home run. He was moved up a spot to cleanup for this game. ... David Eckstein, MVP of the 2006 Series for St. Louis, threw out the first ball. ... 90-year-old Hall of Famer Stan Musial rode in on a golf cart during pregame festivities. ... The crowd of 47,325 was a record for 6-year-old Busch Stadium.
From the CRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR!!! If the CSM is writing about the World Series, you know this has to be~~~extraordinary!!
World Series history: Cardinals over Texas Rangers in 11 is instant classic
Twice the Texas Rangers were within an out of winning the World Series. But the Cardinals came back in dramatic fashion, and David Freese's walk-off in the 11th grabbed a bit of history. There's a new rival for the title of most thrilling Game 6 in World Series history, and new rival for the title of hero.
At the very least, the 11-inning win by the St. Louis Cardinals is an instant classic, one that enters the top tier of postseason epics.
The game twice took the Texas Rangers within one strike of a world championship. It took fans of both teams on an emotional roller coaster. And it is taking the bat and the shredded jersey of David Freese, who homered to win the game and keep Cardinal hopes alive for a Game 7, to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
It was baseball at its white-knuckle, goose-bump finest.
Part comedy of errors, part battle of managerial wits, and no small part a show of performance under pressure.
A recap of the drama: The teams battled to a 4-4 tie by the dawn of the seventh inning, when the Rangers mustered three-run rally. The Cardinals appeared all but doomed when they closed out the eighth inning still two runs down, missing a bases-loaded opportunity.
All the Rangers had to do was have their closer, Neftali Feliz, get three more outs. The first Rangers title ever would be theirs. And Feliz almost accomplished the job. But in the ninth, with two outs and two men on base, Freese tripled to tie the game and send it into extra innings. The Rangers answered with two runs in the top of the 10th.
Again, in the bottom of the inning, the Cardinals came down to their last out. Berkman's single to center field evened up the game yet again, paving the way for an 11th inning after both teams had already worked through most of their available pitchers.
Freese's walk-off home run in the bottom of the inning finished the game. As he struggled to touch home plate amid a swarm of team-mates (one of whom ripped his jersey apart), two things were clear to anybody watching. There would need to be a decisive Game 7. And wow, what a game that was.
So where should this game rest in the baseball pantheon?
Certainly it's up there on a top-hits list, when it comes to multi-act drama in a potentially decisive World Series game. (This wasn't a one-man or one-team show of force, like Don Larsen pitching a perfect game midway through the 1956 World Series.)
That said, let's admit that in baseball's long history, there have been more than a handful of remarkable games that ended or nearly ended the championship series.
It's hard to argue that this one tops the best Game 7s, such as those of 1960 (with Bill Mazeroski's home run for Pittsburgh), 1991 (with Jack Morris's 10-inning shutout for Minnesota), or 1924 (a 12-inning epic). Fans of the game could toss in a number of other favorites.
And what about Carlton Fisk? His 12th-inning home run for the Red Sox in 1975 was another instance of a team fending off doom – in this case the threat that the "Big Red Machine" of Cincinnati would win the Series that night. The Boston catcher famously waved the ball fair, as it veered toward the left-field foul pole in Fenway Park.
To Boston fans and many others, that was unforgettable. To many baseball fans today, Freese's shot holds a candle to it.
The Cardinals' win represents just the third time that a team one out from elimination in the World Series came back to win the game, the Associated Press reports, citing STATS LLC. The New York Mets did it in 1986 (and won the championship in the next game), and the New York Giants did it in 1911, but ended up losing the series.
Indeed, the comparison with Game Six in 1975 reinforces the reminder: The winner of a legendary game isn't always the winner of the Series. The Sox lost to the Reds back then. It remains to be seen what will happen in Game 7 between the Cardinals and Rangers Friday night.
If the Cardinals win, the prominence of this Game 6 will ratchet a notch higher.
The Deciding Game Seven account~~~below, from The Sporting News:
ST. LOUIS—At some point when the Cardinals, their families and friends were romping around Busch Stadium Friday night, Lance Berkman pulled Albert Pujols aside and pleaded, "Come back. Let's do this again."
Though Pujols would not commit, Berkman could not have picked a better time to make his pitch.
The Cardinals had just won Game 7 of the World Series, 6-2 over the Rangers to complete perhaps the most incredible stretch in baseball history.
In the past two months, the Cardinals overcame a 10 1/2-game deficit in the playoff race to win the franchise's 11th World Series championship.
So what did Pujols tell his teammate?
"The same thing I'm going to tell you," Pujols said. "Whatever decision I make is hopefully the best decision for my family and the fans and everybody. To talk about my contract right now is the last thing I'm thinking about. I'm just going to enjoy the moment."
Give the man that much. As he sat at the interview podium with son A.J. along with Chris Carpenter and his two children, Pujols had many moments to soak in.
David Freese was named the World Series MVP. (AP Photo)
There was the late-August players' only meeting that fueled a 22-9 surge that led to clinching the NL wild card on the season's final day.
There was the Game 2 rally from a 4-0 deficit against Cliff Lee and the Phillies and Carpenter's 1-0 masterpiece against Roy Halladay that sent the Cardinals to the NLCS.
There were Pujols' four extra-base hit performance in the NLCS, and his three-homer, five-hit record night in Game 3 of the World Series.
There were nightly hitting heroics from World Series MVP David Freese and Allen Craig, and shutdown performances from the bullpen throughout the NLCS.
And don't forget the comeback of all comebacks in Game 6 of the World Series, when the Cardinals twice were within one strike of being finished, but pulled out a 10-9, 11-inning victory.
"This is what you dream about," manager Tony La Russa said. "It's hard to really imagine it actually happened."
Steering the journey were the two veterans in the interview room, Pujols and Carpenter.
They were among a handful of Cardinals around for the 2006 championship who took extra pleasure in helping all the newcomers become a part of Cardinals' history. This club has some history, too, with its 11 championships second only to the Yankees' 27.
There were plenty of newcomers able to celebrate their first championship, from Berkman to Matt Holliday to Octavio Dotel, Rafael Furcal and 20-year veteran Arthur Rhodes. "To have the opportunity to experience that, with guys that haven't experienced this before that have been around a long time is amazing," Carpenter said.
After years of competing against the Cardinals with the Astros, Berkman had to join the Cardinals to become a champion. The feeling, he said, surpassed his expectations. "Way better," he said as he remained on the field long after the game had ended and the trophy presentation had concluded. "You can't imagine the exhilaration of finally winning, particular in the fashion that we did. It wasn't like we swept four games in four laughers. We had to fight this whole series, this whole postseason."
With as many young players as veterans contributing to the championship has owner Bill DeWitt looking forward to next year.
"The great thing about winning like this with young players is now they have now gone through it," DeWitt said. "They may not have played a lot of years in the big leagues but to have succeeded at this level is a great foundation of future success."
The only hitch, DeWitt sees is the Cardinals being in a new role in 2012. "I feel great about the young players we have. We've re-signed a lot of our veterans who are exceptional players. We feel great about our club in the future.
"We were the underdog in all these series," he said. "But I guess if you're the world champions, you won't be the underdogs."
The architect of the no-longer underdogs roster, GM John Mozeliak, was not quite ready to look at 2012. "We'll enjoy this for 72 hours and then we'll get going," he said.
All of baseball will be watching as the Cardinals try to retain Pujols. Winning a second championship makes it even more difficult to picture Pujols playing elsewhere.
"We never talked about it (during the season)," La Russa said. "Now it's time to start talking about it. The organization is going to try to keep him here and Albert wants to stay here, and best effort, we'll see if it comes off or not."
After this wild ride, seeing Pujols re-up might be the only way to have any more fun than they've had the past two months.
AND~~~From Sporting News as well:
ST. LOUIS— David Freese, the hometown boy made good, is the MVP of the World Series.
Down to their final strike in Game 6, the Cardinals' reluctant hero delivered a tying two-run triple in the ninth inning Thursday night. Freese then did one better: a leadoff homer in the 11th that gave St. Louis a dramatic win over the Rangers and forced the first Game 7 since 2002.
Freese, also the NL championship series MVP, capped his memorable October by hitting a two-run double in the first inning Friday night to tie the Texas Rangers at 2-all. He also drew a pair of walks that helped lead to runs, and the Cardinals held on for a 6-2 win and their 11th championship.
"This means everything," Freese said.
When the final out was made, Freese threw his arms in the air and dashed for the mound, where he joined a happy scrum as confetti floated down from the upper reaches of Busch Stadium.
"This is why you keep battling," Freese said. "Sometimes things don't work out, you get injured, you do stupid stuff, but you try to stay on path. You surround yourself with guys like we have on this team. I'm so glad to be part of this."
Freese batted .348 in the World Series, with seven RBIs, three doubles and one big homer. He's the fourth Cardinals player to win the MVP award, joining Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Gibson in 1964 and '67, catcher Darrell Porter in 1982 and David Eckstein in their 2006 victory over Detroit.
"You learn from all these veterans about how to go about this game," Freese said, "and I wouldn't be here without them."
Freese could just as well be the MVP of the entire postseason.
The kid who grew up in a St. Louis suburb hit a three-run homer in Game 6 of the NLCS against Milwaukee, the first act in his coming out party. His performance in Act 2 against the Rangers made him the sixth player to be MVP of a championship series and the World Series.
Often lost in a high-scoring lineup that includes Albert Pujols, Matt Holliday and Lance Berkman, Freese left his impression on baseball's grandest stage out of necessity.
Holliday struggled most of the series before spraining his right wrist during Game 6, taking him off the roster Friday. Pujols was intentionally walked whenever he was a threat.
That left the offense to Freese, who had given up on baseball after high school, spurning a scholarship offer from Missouri to simply be a college student. He even rebuffed the Tigers' coaches when they called midway through his first semester to find out whether he'd changed his mind.
It wasn't until about a year out of high school that the itch to play finally returned.
David Freese was named the 2011 World Series MVP. (AP Photo)
Freese gave in and enrolled at St. Louis Community College-Meremec, and his play there caught the attention of the coaching staff at South Alabama. Freese blossomed into the Padres' ninth-round draft pick in 2006, and a trade to the Cardinals eventually brought him home.
"If you wrote a story like that — a guy gets traded, comes back to his hometown, he's a hero — if you sent that in the script, it would get thrown back in your face," Commissioner Bud Selig said.
This wasn't a perfect fairy tale, though. That would be too easy.
Freese needed season-ending surgery to repair a torn tendon in his right ankle last year, and he broke his left hand when he was hit by a pitch earlier this season. He was hit by another pitch in August and sustained a concussion.
Each time, he came back better than before.
He was at his best against Texas.
In the World Series opener, with the game tied in the sixth inning, Freese delivered a timely double. He alertly moved to third base on a wild pitch, allowing him to score easily for the eventual winning run on Allen Craig's single to right field.
Freese scored the Cardinals' only run in a 2-1 loss in Game 2, and then drove in a pair of runs in a 16-7 victory in Game 3 — a performance that will be forever overshadowed by Pujols' three homers.
Nobody could overshadow Freese in Game 6.
After committing a critical error when an easy popup bounced out of his glove, Freese more than made up for it with his bat. Down to his final strike, his two-run triple in the ninth forced extra innings. In the 11th, he joined Bill Mazeroski, Carlton Fisk, Kirby Puckett and Joe Carter as the only players to hit a game-winning homer in Game 6 or later of a Fall Classic.
That's pretty select company.
Much like the company he'll enjoy as MVP of the World Series.
"I've had plenty of days in my life where I'd thought, you know, I wouldn't even be close to being a big leaguer," Freese said. "I'm here because of everyone around me. They put so much trust in me to accomplish, not just baseball, but stuff in life. To do this, I'm just full of joy.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Sunday, October 23, 2011
THIS MAGIC MOMENT: SO DIFFERENT & SO NEW
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
Have you ever hated yourself for staring at the phone?
You're whole life waiting on the ring to prove you're not alone
Have you ever been touched so gently you had to cry?
Have you ever invited a stranger to come inside?~~~"Glitter In The Air"~~~PINK
I was watching this movie Saturday night, 22 October 2011, on one of my HBO channels. This movie has been on the schedule for quite some time already, but mostly because it looked like one of those animated Pixar Movies directed toward the children, I had always declined viewing it. But then again, a light would go off in my head reminding me that many of these PIXAR Movies are, in effect, morality-plays for adults. And of course, it is Saturday Night. The sports cable networks are punctuated with college football, boxing, soccer, and sports talk-shows. On FOXTV, is the World Series, already in progress. What do I do??? I decide to watch HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON. As It turns out, this animated movie had many adult themes.
There is this one theme; in effect this one scene, that so unequivocally captivated the powerful transformation of "Falling-In-Love." That~~~Magic-Moment, if you will---when everything else in the cosmos moves in slow-motion.
As I watched this, I did get choked-up. This is--what all women want. They don't care about the physicality of a man. A woman is hard-wired to have their breath taken away. They want to be swept off of their feet.
Men and women, from the beginning of time, have found themselves brought together by fate, happenstance, circumstances, and the time/space continuum. But what separates these happenstances, and the sense of Destiny enveloping us---is this epiphany.
This is what happened to Astrid, the temperamental, impatient, and feisty young lady aspiring to be a Viking-warrior of the Village of Berk. In terms of the future for the Village of Berk, as the next generation protecting their homeland, Astrid viewed Hiccup apprehensively as a liability---not an asset.
In the inter-activity of these two, through-out the first part of the movie, there exists this constant tension; this constant need to demonstrate their value---to themselves, and the community in which they are a part of.
A woman doesn't want to just exist. She wants definition, meaning, and a raison d'etre to be walking side-by-side with the man of her dreams.
In this scene that reshaped my understanding of this exquisite moment, and had myself privy to the oracles, it was so because I had taken that metaphoric bite of the fruit from the tree of knowledge, and the mystery had become a baptism.
Night Fury
Personality
Reclusive, analytical, inventive and the most intelligent of the known dragon species.
HAH! Factor
PICKY EATER - If a Night Fury eats something it doesn't like, stand back. Flaming food flies fast.
AHH! Factor
KAMEKAZE BOMBER - Using the night sky to conceal its dark hide, it dive bombs villages, ships and armies virtually unseen.
Weapons
Dive bombing, Speed, Agility, explosive fireballs
For Astrid, Hiccup was transformed from an also-ran, to the master of his fate; the captain of his soul. In that magical moment where all of the cosmos took on an euphoric vista, she had had her breath taken away; she was swept off of her feet. With Hiccup taking Astrid through the proverbial looking-glass, and onto the magic-carpet-ride with Alladin's genie-lamp in tow, Astrid had now meta-morphed into Hiccup's Forever Destiny. She was no longer just a mortal lady, but now possessed a transfigured immortal soul. Her very essence was now filled with a pentecostal spirit. She was redeemed; she had everlasting life, and it was reflected so emphatically, as Astrid & Hiccup both soared through the air, Astrid's arms securely wrapped tightly around Hiccup, saddled atop Toothless, the Night Fury Dragon.
Astrid would now be willing to place her hand in Hiccup's, and together, travel To The Ends Of Time.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Have you ever hated yourself for staring at the phone?
You're whole life waiting on the ring to prove you're not alone
Have you ever been touched so gently you had to cry?
Have you ever invited a stranger to come inside?~~~"Glitter In The Air"~~~PINK
I was watching this movie Saturday night, 22 October 2011, on one of my HBO channels. This movie has been on the schedule for quite some time already, but mostly because it looked like one of those animated Pixar Movies directed toward the children, I had always declined viewing it. But then again, a light would go off in my head reminding me that many of these PIXAR Movies are, in effect, morality-plays for adults. And of course, it is Saturday Night. The sports cable networks are punctuated with college football, boxing, soccer, and sports talk-shows. On FOXTV, is the World Series, already in progress. What do I do??? I decide to watch HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON. As It turns out, this animated movie had many adult themes.
There is this one theme; in effect this one scene, that so unequivocally captivated the powerful transformation of "Falling-In-Love." That~~~Magic-Moment, if you will---when everything else in the cosmos moves in slow-motion.
As I watched this, I did get choked-up. This is--what all women want. They don't care about the physicality of a man. A woman is hard-wired to have their breath taken away. They want to be swept off of their feet.
Men and women, from the beginning of time, have found themselves brought together by fate, happenstance, circumstances, and the time/space continuum. But what separates these happenstances, and the sense of Destiny enveloping us---is this epiphany.
This is what happened to Astrid, the temperamental, impatient, and feisty young lady aspiring to be a Viking-warrior of the Village of Berk. In terms of the future for the Village of Berk, as the next generation protecting their homeland, Astrid viewed Hiccup apprehensively as a liability---not an asset.
In the inter-activity of these two, through-out the first part of the movie, there exists this constant tension; this constant need to demonstrate their value---to themselves, and the community in which they are a part of.
A woman doesn't want to just exist. She wants definition, meaning, and a raison d'etre to be walking side-by-side with the man of her dreams.
In this scene that reshaped my understanding of this exquisite moment, and had myself privy to the oracles, it was so because I had taken that metaphoric bite of the fruit from the tree of knowledge, and the mystery had become a baptism.
Night Fury
Personality
Reclusive, analytical, inventive and the most intelligent of the known dragon species.
HAH! Factor
PICKY EATER - If a Night Fury eats something it doesn't like, stand back. Flaming food flies fast.
AHH! Factor
KAMEKAZE BOMBER - Using the night sky to conceal its dark hide, it dive bombs villages, ships and armies virtually unseen.
Weapons
Dive bombing, Speed, Agility, explosive fireballs
For Astrid, Hiccup was transformed from an also-ran, to the master of his fate; the captain of his soul. In that magical moment where all of the cosmos took on an euphoric vista, she had had her breath taken away; she was swept off of her feet. With Hiccup taking Astrid through the proverbial looking-glass, and onto the magic-carpet-ride with Alladin's genie-lamp in tow, Astrid had now meta-morphed into Hiccup's Forever Destiny. She was no longer just a mortal lady, but now possessed a transfigured immortal soul. Her very essence was now filled with a pentecostal spirit. She was redeemed; she had everlasting life, and it was reflected so emphatically, as Astrid & Hiccup both soared through the air, Astrid's arms securely wrapped tightly around Hiccup, saddled atop Toothless, the Night Fury Dragon.
Astrid would now be willing to place her hand in Hiccup's, and together, travel To The Ends Of Time.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
Many People Suffering With No Financial Help
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
There was always something more important to do,
More important to say
But "I love you" wasn't one of those things,
And now it's too late
Do you remember~~~Phil Collins; Do You Remember
The start of the NFL 2011 Season has Buffalo Bills fans excited. At this point of the season the team is 3-0. And, for the first time in YEARS, Buffalo Bills quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick was named NFL offensive athlete of the month of September. All-in-all, some pretty lofty stratospheres of accomplishments, enthusiasm, anticipation. This string of consecutive wins, coming out of the starting blocks, has me put together a reflection on what this current phenomenon means to me, and my life-experience. The BELOW is an essay that is posted in CLASSMATES:
REFLECTION OF AN EIGHTH GRADE EXPERIENCE @
ANNUNCIATION~~~
Having attended Annunciation Grade School(on and off) since fifth grade, John George was by-and-large just another classmate. But, as our eighth grade experience was unfolding in September of 1964, John & I discovered something that the both of us had in common. We both had come to realize that we had an intense appreciation of the Buffalo Bills football team. On the Monday mornings subsequent to each game, we both headed to school in anticipation of the before-class conversations which were increasingly heightened, and the enthusiasm and excitement of our interactivity intensified. The reason for this was because the Buffalo Bills were stringing together a series of consecutive wins---since the Season Opener. In this Season where they would ultimately go toe-to-toe, for the first time, to win the A F L CHAMPIONSHIP against the frustrated San Diego Chargers, the Buffalo Bills had strung together 9 consecutive regular-season wins, before they would lose their first game. This accomplishment, during the 1964-1965 Season, is still---a Franchise Record.
The 1964-1965 AFL Championship win was the FIRST win against the Chargers. This is the championship year where linebacker Mike Stratton executed the "shot heard 'round the world" in tackling Keith Lincoln, breaking his ribs and taking Lincoln~~~and the Chargers, out of the game!!
Ultimately, high school, and the paths and tangents of life would facilitate the separation that continues regarding John and myself, but for this one period of time, brought about by a sports phenomenon and some larger-than-life local sports heroes that we just absolutely fell in love with, we were inseparable!!
BELOW is The SPOTLIGHT article which was in the BUFFALO NEWS SUNDAY 25 September 2011. The article, for myself, was poignant from a couple of standpoints. The first point of concern is becoming afflicted with a handicap, and having to deal with it personally, physically, and financially. The second point is having to do with how those in your immediate vicinity, that is to say most typically; your family members---how do they respond to your circumstances.
When life gets hard
A memoir by the wife of a construction worker paralyzed from the chest down exposes the pain, struggle and hope the couple share
By Charity Vogel
NEWS STAFF REPORTER
Updated: September 26, 2011, 7:32 AM
There are people who never break step when dealing with a loved one’s devastating injury. They face the public with a smile and are as strong as steel–and they never let anyone see that steel melt down. ¶ And then there is everybody else. ¶ Melanie Winkler D’Andrea is not ashamed to say she is firmly among the melt-downers. The I-can’t-go-on-anymores, the grimacers instead of grinners. ¶ There were times, after her husband Dan was injured, when she went weeks on end without a single “good”day. ¶ She is a nurse, but there are chores she handled for her husband that she could never bring herself to like. ¶ And there was one point, a really bad point, when she contemplated ending her own life, just to escape. ¶ “I just felt so hopeless,” said Melanie, 57. “I was so sick in my head, so depressed.” ¶ The reality is, having your life turned upside down and torn apart is not easy, and it doesn’t feel particularly noble, either. ¶ But, through it all, through the pain and hardship, Melanie can say that she never broke a promise she made to herself: that she would never question God about why she and Dan were suffering.
Now, seven years later, as she grapples with her own chronic health problems, Melanie D’Andrea is opening her heart in a revealing memoir, “One Door at a Time.” She pulls no punches about how difficult it can be to cope when a loved one suffers a debilitating injury, like the accident that happened to Dan.
“I had to pray and think,” Melanie said, about writing the book. “I thought, people are going to find out what I am really like. That was frightening.
“But this is a story that needed to be told.”
Dan D’Andrea worked in construction, and he has a hard time thinking about the workplace accident that left him paralyzed from the chest down. But he has no trouble voicing support for his wife and her effort to increase awareness about disability.
“Melanie is a genuine person,” Dan said. “A real person.”
The story of Melanie and Dan D’Andrea is many things. A story of struggle; a story of persistence. It is also, a love story.
Next to that, the D’Andreas know, even pain and despair amount to nothing.
A Dan-friendly home
Their sunny, spacious ranch house in Amherst is much changed from when the D’Andreas moved in nine years ago, after their wedding.
Originally a 900-square-foot starter home, the house was expanded and made handicapped-accessible after Dan’s 2004 injury. They joke that the house is not just handicapped- friendly, it’s “Dan-friendly,” tailored to his frame, the size of the wheelchair he uses and his range of motion.
“Our goal was for me to be as independent as possible,” Dan said. “I refuse to have people come to the house [as caregivers]. That was probably hard on my wife. I want to be independent –as much as I possibly could be.”
Ask the couple about painful moments they’ve encountered outside the sanctuary of that home, and they’ll give you a litany. Of how Dan was pushed aside in the doorway of a restaurant, because his wheelchair made him slow. Or about the time their hotel, with so-called “accessible” rooms, had only a regular standing shower stall with a rim to climb over. Or about how few of Western New York’s parks allow the nature-loving Dan the kind of outdoor access he craves.
“There’s a gap out there,” Dan said, of the way disability is viewed. “I would like to see inclusion. So anywhere you go, anyone with a disability can do anything anybody else can.”
There are plenty of people who would agree with him.
About 6 million people –1.9 percent of the U. S. population –are living with paralysis of one form or another, according to the latest research by the Christopher&Dana Reeve Foundation, done in conjunction with universities, medical centers and the Centers for Disease Control. That number is more than 30 percent higher than was previously believed, the foundation reported. And nearly 1.3 million people in the country are living with a spinal-cord injury.
Melanie struggles when she sees the way the world treats her formerly strapping young husband –the petty injustices, the casual lack of concern.
People who know the couple have noticed it as well.
“What I have learned from them is how badly people treat the disabled. I see [Melanie and Dan] out, and how disrespectful people are,” said Donna Alessi, a family friend.
“They’ve been through a lot together.”
A good team
No one would have predicted this sort of road for Melanie and Dan D’Andrea.
From the time they met in May 1998, they have been inseparable. Melanie, a Dunkirk native, had lived in the Denver area for more than 20 years.
Newly single after a divorce, she decided to move back to Western New York and found an apartment in Amherst. Her next-door neighbor was a good-looking construction worker named Dan.
“Out comes Prince Charming,” recalled Melanie, of how Dan came over to help her move in.
Dan was 15 years younger than Melanie. But that didn’t seem to be an issue.
“He was rugged-looking,” said Melanie. “I thought he was older than he was. When I found out [his true age], I thought, oh no. And then it just didn’t matter.”
The pair started attending church together –Catholic Mass, where Melanie introduced Dan to a priest she admired. Dan felt himself becoming more spiritual through her influence. “I was pretty religious then,” he said. “I still talk to God every day. It might not be what he wants to hear.”
Before long the couple moved in together and then, in 2002, they married.
“Melanie had said she would never remarry –so I was surprised she changed her mind about that,” said Christine Woodbury of Clarence, Melanie’s younger sister. “Dan must be special. I don’t know that anyone else could have talked her into marriage.”
As newlyweds, the D’Andreas were the kind of couple friends would exclaim over. They complemented each other well. They laughed easily together. Each worked at a demanding job–Melanie as a nurse, Dan in construction –and supported the other’s ambitions.
“They made a good team,” said Woodbury.
The D’Andreas were the kind of couple people envy –until the day everything changed.
Tragedy strikes
It was a normal weekday in December 2004. Melanie was in the middle of a typical day in her job, as a triage nurse who worked over the phone from home.
She had just gotten off a call when the phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number on her caller ID. In her memoir, Melanie writes about what happened next:
“I knew immediately that something was off.
‘Honey I’m hurt real bad.’ Dan was crying. Now THAT was unheard of. I had seen him cry only once, at his mother’s funeral five years earlier. “I can’t move. I can’t feel anything from my chest down. I can’t move my legs. I can’t feel my feet! I’m talking on somebody’s cellphone. I can’t get to mine because I’m hurt.”
“Dan’s panic, transferred to me through the phone line, hit me like an electric current.”
Dan, then 35, had been working on a job site renovating Buffalo’s old Holling Press building. He had been standing in an elevator shaft when a plank fell from a floor above, plummeted down the shaft and landed on the back of Dan’s neck, crushing the top of his spine.
He crumpled to the ground, unable to feel anything below the middle of his chest.
He was taken to Erie County Medical Center and spent weeks in trauma care.
This was a dark time for the couple, Melanie writes in her memoir. Dan, who was usually unconscious, reacted badly to some of his medications; he would thrash around and try to pull out his IVs, and there was a chance of him hurting himself further.
“The doctor told us it was the reaction of an able-bodied young man who had the strength of an animal, being trapped inside his body,” said Melanie. “They told me early on that he would probably never walk –but that he would probably not die.”
The D’Andreas were clearly in life-changing circumstances, said attorney Terrence M. Connors, who represented them from these early days after the accident.
“He was in rough shape. [Dan] was barely conscious when we first saw him,” said Connors.
As for Melanie, Connors said, she was already focused on the reality before her.
“Right from the beginning, Melanie knew it was going to be a very difficult row to hoe for him,” Connors said. “She said to us, ‘I just want your candor. I just want you to be honest with me.’ She knew how difficult it was going to be. And not just the physical, but the emotional side of it.”
Melanie said she knew right away what she and Dan were up against.
“From the day it happened, I knew that he wasn’t going to walk again,”Melanie said. “I didn’t go through a grieving process –I went right to the reality.”
Hard to handle
After a week, Dan began to creep back to lucidity. He was in the hospital for weeks. In January 2005, the couple decided it was time to seek treatment that might give him a chance at movement.
Craig Hospital in Colorado is one of the country’s premier resources for spinal-cord injury, according to experts at the Christopher&Dana Reeve Foundation.
“If you go to the local hospital and they see two or three spinal-cord injuries a year, that’s way different from going to a major center where they see hundreds of these cases a year,” said Joe Canose, senior vice president for quality of life at the foundation, located in Short Hills, N. J.
Dan went to Craig by Lear jet. Once there, he was immersed in extensive rehab sessions, counseling, and medical treatments designed to make him as independent and mobile as possible. Some 23 percent of cases of paralysis are caused by spinal-cord injury, second only to stroke, the Reeve Foundation data shows.
Melanie, meanwhile, was facing her own troubles. As her husband progressed, she found herself having “meltdowns” in her new role as caregiver.
To take one example: in the book, she writes about how hard it was for her to handle Dan’s toileting needs, since he could not control his bladder and bowels until he learned to follow a bowel “program.” One night she bought them a takeout dinner; it passed immediately through Dan, and she spent the next several hours cleaning the bed, floor and bathroom of their apartment in Denver. As she writes:
“Imagine one minute you are having what you hope will be a romantic, cozy dinner with your husband. In the next moment, you are changing the pants of that same 200-pound man. He has just had the largest diarrhea stool of his life. Imagine having nothing available to you but your bare hands, a few towels, and a wash rag. Imagine wondering if this is the first day of the rest of your life.”
It was in these early months that Melanie began to assemble voluminous scrapbooks about their experiences. She also began writing in a series of journals –tattered memo notebooks –that gave her room to chart Dan’s progress, as well as vent her own emotions.
“There’s pressure on [the patient] to progress. And pressure is on the caregiver, to put up or shut up,” she said. “I felt that all the time –yet I wasn’t the one who was injured, so what did I have to complain about?”
Writing it all down
It was about this time that Melanie also realized that, apart from actor Christopher Reeve’s account of his paralysis, there were very few books that offered any insight into what being a caregiver and spouse of a spinal-cord-injured person was like.
“Seven years ago, I didn’t see anything,” she said.
Along the way, her thoughts grew into a plan: to write an honest account of what her journey was like. She drew from her journals, her scrapbooks and her memories.
“I felt compelled to write about it,”Melanie said. “If just one person reads it and tells me that they loved it and it helped them, I’ve reached my goal.”
At the Reeve Foundation, Canose said that people underestimate the broader impact of a paralyzing injury.
“A spinal-cord injury in a family affects the whole family,” Canose said. “There’s a lot of families that don’t [make it]. Some can’t handle it.”
For caregivers, Canose said, the difficulty of the role lies in its neverendingness.
“It’s 24/7. That’s the difference,” he said. “You’re on call all the time – to handle issues you’d rather not deal with.”
Melanie said she would like to use any proceeds she realizes from the memoir to fund equipment and programs that would help disabled people in Western New York.
Dan, too, has found a way to get past his injury and reach out a helping hand.
He has set up a charitable trust with some of the settlement he and Melanie received from his lawsuit over his injury. Dan was awarded $27 million from four insurance carriers in the settlement.
And Dan–who has not regained any significant mobility in his lower body–has taken steps to more publicly advocate on the local level about disability. He sits on an advisory board to the Amherst town government on disability issues. His trust has funded programs designed to train local governments about issues of handicapped access and sensitivity.
“My vision is more local. His is wider,” Melanie said of her husband.
A strong will
Today, the D’Andreas are coping with another difficult reality: Melanie’s recent diagnosis with leukemia.
Melanie told Dan after hearing the news from doctors, despite knowing the toll it would take. The good news is, her illness appears to be a slow-moving, chronic variety. The bad news is, they had just felt they were getting their bearings after Dan’s paralysis.
“I have a hard time keeping anything from him –painfully so,” said Melanie. “I broke it to him right away.”
Dan said that her illness is difficult for him to understand.
“It was just another thing on the pile, you know?” he said. “It’s just the kind of luck we seem to get. You don’t know what to expect next.”
As for Melanie, she figures she’ll play this hand the same way she played the one she was dealt with Dan’s accident.
With pragmatism –and a strong will.
“I had made that promise, remember?” she said. “Not to question: why us?”
“I ask that a lot,” interjects Dan, sitting by her side.
Melanie smiles at him. “You didn’t make the promise.”
THE article impacted me deeply. I felt compelled to write to the NEWS about it. The BELOW was my 'first' manuscript:
Dear Editors;
Regarding the saga of the D'Andreas in your Sunday SPOTLIGHT story of "When Life Gets Hard",
the D'Andreas had my heart, soul, and inspiration until I read about their $27,000,000.00 settlement.
The empathy levels were in overdrive, but the levels admittedly started to downshift once I saw the
Connors name mentioned. I, of course, am aware that Connors is a high-visibility injury-attorney in the
Buffalo area. Being advised two paragraphs later that D'Andrea's work-related injury culminated in a
multi-million dollar settlement, my emotional attachment dropped to neutral.
That revelation had me posturing for the position that the circumstance leading up to accident, and the
subsequent debilitating lifestyle is unfortunate, but they have ample resources at their disposal to
mitigate the pain.
There is another part of the disability world where there are many of us who do not have such resources
at their disposal to mitigate their pain. Mother Nature imposed on me, in midlife, a very very debilitating
disability which continues to be a slow-progressive degeneration type of Muscular Dystrophy. There is no
cure. As debilitating as this handicap is, I am reduced to SSDI benefits---and working part-time, to make
ends meet. With SSDI rules being what they are my part-time income is about to be diminished further
compounding the angst of making ends meet.
The disability is such that I literally no longer possess any sense of balance. And my legs are a twisting,
and a reduced-strength, mess. Over short distances I can assume the erect position and ambulate with
the aid of a reciprocal walker, but longer distances must be traversed with the aid of a battery-powered
scooter.
The family-factor is a curious one. There will be occasions where help is offered and evident, but by-and large
it postures itself in suspended-animation, awaiting my request to ask for it. And even when it is requested,
sometimes the 'bedside-manner is evident, and sometimes, it is not.
With all due respect, D'Andrea Family, you've been provided an extraordinary blessing; an extraordinary resource
to adequately address the misfortune.
Because I didn't want the 'world' to be bearing witness to this one particular 'cross' that I am contending with, I decided to delete the: "The Family-factor" paragraph from essay so that the finished-product sent to THE NEWS read as follows:
Regarding the saga of the D'Andreas in your Sunday SPOTLIGHT story of "When Life Gets Hard",
the D'Andreas had my heart, soul, and inspiration until I read about their $27,000,000.00 settlement.
The empathy levels were in overdrive, but the levels admittedly started to downshift once I saw the
Connors name mentioned. I, of course, am aware that Connors is a high-visibility injury-attorney in the
Buffalo area. Being advised two paragraphs later that D'Andrea's work-related injury culminated in a
multi-million dollar settlement, my emotional attachment dropped to neutral.
That revelation had me posturing for the position that the circumstance leading up to accident, and the
subsequent debilitating lifestyle is unfortunate, but they have ample resources at their disposal to
mitigate the pain.
There is another part of the disability world where there are many of us who do not have such resources
at their disposal to mitigate their pain. Mother Nature imposed on me, in midlife, a very very debilitating
disability which continues to be a slow-progressive degeneration type of Muscular Dystrophy. There is no
cure. As debilitating as this handicap is, I am reduced to SSDI benefits---and working part-time, to make
ends meet. With SSDI rules being what they are, my part-time income is about to be diminished further
compounding the angst of making ends meet.
My disability is such that I literally no longer possess any sense of balance. And my legs are a twisting,
and a reduced-strength, mess. Over short distances I can assume the erect position and ambulate with
the aid of a reciprocal walker, but longer distances must be traversed with the aid of a battery-powered
scooter.
With all due respect, D'Andrea Family, you've been provided an extraordinary blessing; an extraordinary resource
to adequately address the misfortune.
BELOW is what the NEWS printed Monday 3 October, in their Editorial page:
I am writing in regard to the saga of Melanie and Dan D’Andreas, which was featured in the Sept. 25 Spotlight story, “When life gets hard.” They had my heart, soul and inspiration until I read about their $27 million settlement for his work-related injury.
That revelation had me posturing to the position that the circumstances leading up to the accident and the subsequent debilitating lifestyle are unfortunate, but they have ample resources at their disposal to mitigate the pain.
There is another part of the disability world in which many of us do not have such resources at our disposal to mitigate our pain. Mother Nature imposed on me, in midlife, a very debilitating disability that continues to be a progressive degeneration type of muscular dystrophy. There is no cure. As debilitating as this handicap is, I am reduced to Social Security Disability Insurance benefits and working part time to make ends meet. With SSDI rules being what they are, my part-time income is about to be diminished, further compounding the angst of making ends meet.
My disability is such that I no longer possess any sense of balance and my twisted legs are a reduced-strength mess. Over short distances, I can assume the erect position and ambulate with the aid of a reciprocal walker, but longer distances must be traversed with the aid of a battery-powered scooter.
With all due respect, the D’Andreas family has been provided an extraordinary blessing—an extraordinary resource to adequately address the misfortune.
If I may be allowed to pull the curtain open just a tad, the family-factor is a curious one. There will be occasions where help is offered and evident, but by-and large
it postures itself in suspended-animation, awaiting my request to ask for it. And even when it is requested,
sometimes the 'bedside-manner is evident, and sometimes, it is not. Even something spontaneous and out-of-the-clear-blue; while looking me square in the eye---something like: "How are you doing?" Are you feeling alright?" "Do you need anything; CAN I GET YOU ANYTHING?" I will hear questions as these coming from strangers and acquaintances, but I will not hear these kinds of questions from family members. And least of all: Donna. She is currently in an accelerated-program in Lou-avoidance. And, of course, with me having released her, she may feel that her 'responsibility' as my partner, is significantly diminished. She is probably thinking in a relieved way, that it is no longer incumbent upon her to provide as a wife-partner should. She will 'set-up' water & milk on the kitchen table for me on the mornings that I have to get to the ECBOE. She does this because she is up already anyways to have to get to her cleaning assignments. It is there, resting on the table, awaiting me. Donna though, is long-gone; no note or expression of affection. She will be gone all day. And she will make sure she is gone long enough so that her 'responsibility' to prepare supper defaults to Andrew. Just to clear the air, in case there is some oversight on the CORE issue, if I could reasonably prepare or attain my suppers, trust me, I would. There was once-upon-a-time, myself possessing the ability to do such routine tasks. Be assured, if I, like ATLAS, could continue to carry the world on my shoulders, I would. In an embracing relationship, in a loving relationship, these gestures would certainly not be considered 'tasks'. They are in this household. Out of the seven days in the week, Donna's actual preparation of the supper---may be two days. Andrew, by-and-large, covers five or the seven days. Part of why she relinquishes the supper arrangement to Andrew, as well, has to do with the fact that she simply DOES NOT WANT TO SHARE MY COMPANY. One would think I was plagued with leprosy. It is as if I am adjudicated to solitary confinement. That is as realistic as it actually is. I have no company, no conversation, and unless I initiate a gesture like a 'good-night', none is offered. Same with a good-morning. I don't think I have heard a good-morning from anybody, in this house. And she is good at putting on the spectacle for her next set of suitors. She can display the colorful feathers as well as any peacock can---and she knows this. This is why she gets all of the attention and credit, while I, like Cinderella, lay shattered and torn, in the isolation of the 'corner'. With myself, in the words of U-2, she can be---as cold as ice. I have no idea how she is willingly conducting herself as a human being. The no-contact, the no-conversations, the no-interactivity, the no-embracing, the no-kissing, the no-hand holding, is gut-wrenching for me. This is the course-of-action which she chooses to prefer.
She is either cold, heartless, and hypocritical, or she is engaged with someone else already. For me, solitary confinement is virtually unlivable. And yet---this is the sentence I am given to serve---for my transgressions.
work still in progress...
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
There was always something more important to do,
More important to say
But "I love you" wasn't one of those things,
And now it's too late
Do you remember~~~Phil Collins; Do You Remember
The start of the NFL 2011 Season has Buffalo Bills fans excited. At this point of the season the team is 3-0. And, for the first time in YEARS, Buffalo Bills quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick was named NFL offensive athlete of the month of September. All-in-all, some pretty lofty stratospheres of accomplishments, enthusiasm, anticipation. This string of consecutive wins, coming out of the starting blocks, has me put together a reflection on what this current phenomenon means to me, and my life-experience. The BELOW is an essay that is posted in CLASSMATES:
REFLECTION OF AN EIGHTH GRADE EXPERIENCE @
ANNUNCIATION~~~
Having attended Annunciation Grade School(on and off) since fifth grade, John George was by-and-large just another classmate. But, as our eighth grade experience was unfolding in September of 1964, John & I discovered something that the both of us had in common. We both had come to realize that we had an intense appreciation of the Buffalo Bills football team. On the Monday mornings subsequent to each game, we both headed to school in anticipation of the before-class conversations which were increasingly heightened, and the enthusiasm and excitement of our interactivity intensified. The reason for this was because the Buffalo Bills were stringing together a series of consecutive wins---since the Season Opener. In this Season where they would ultimately go toe-to-toe, for the first time, to win the A F L CHAMPIONSHIP against the frustrated San Diego Chargers, the Buffalo Bills had strung together 9 consecutive regular-season wins, before they would lose their first game. This accomplishment, during the 1964-1965 Season, is still---a Franchise Record.
The 1964-1965 AFL Championship win was the FIRST win against the Chargers. This is the championship year where linebacker Mike Stratton executed the "shot heard 'round the world" in tackling Keith Lincoln, breaking his ribs and taking Lincoln~~~and the Chargers, out of the game!!
Ultimately, high school, and the paths and tangents of life would facilitate the separation that continues regarding John and myself, but for this one period of time, brought about by a sports phenomenon and some larger-than-life local sports heroes that we just absolutely fell in love with, we were inseparable!!
BELOW is The SPOTLIGHT article which was in the BUFFALO NEWS SUNDAY 25 September 2011. The article, for myself, was poignant from a couple of standpoints. The first point of concern is becoming afflicted with a handicap, and having to deal with it personally, physically, and financially. The second point is having to do with how those in your immediate vicinity, that is to say most typically; your family members---how do they respond to your circumstances.
When life gets hard
A memoir by the wife of a construction worker paralyzed from the chest down exposes the pain, struggle and hope the couple share
By Charity Vogel
NEWS STAFF REPORTER
Updated: September 26, 2011, 7:32 AM
There are people who never break step when dealing with a loved one’s devastating injury. They face the public with a smile and are as strong as steel–and they never let anyone see that steel melt down. ¶ And then there is everybody else. ¶ Melanie Winkler D’Andrea is not ashamed to say she is firmly among the melt-downers. The I-can’t-go-on-anymores, the grimacers instead of grinners. ¶ There were times, after her husband Dan was injured, when she went weeks on end without a single “good”day. ¶ She is a nurse, but there are chores she handled for her husband that she could never bring herself to like. ¶ And there was one point, a really bad point, when she contemplated ending her own life, just to escape. ¶ “I just felt so hopeless,” said Melanie, 57. “I was so sick in my head, so depressed.” ¶ The reality is, having your life turned upside down and torn apart is not easy, and it doesn’t feel particularly noble, either. ¶ But, through it all, through the pain and hardship, Melanie can say that she never broke a promise she made to herself: that she would never question God about why she and Dan were suffering.
Now, seven years later, as she grapples with her own chronic health problems, Melanie D’Andrea is opening her heart in a revealing memoir, “One Door at a Time.” She pulls no punches about how difficult it can be to cope when a loved one suffers a debilitating injury, like the accident that happened to Dan.
“I had to pray and think,” Melanie said, about writing the book. “I thought, people are going to find out what I am really like. That was frightening.
“But this is a story that needed to be told.”
Dan D’Andrea worked in construction, and he has a hard time thinking about the workplace accident that left him paralyzed from the chest down. But he has no trouble voicing support for his wife and her effort to increase awareness about disability.
“Melanie is a genuine person,” Dan said. “A real person.”
The story of Melanie and Dan D’Andrea is many things. A story of struggle; a story of persistence. It is also, a love story.
Next to that, the D’Andreas know, even pain and despair amount to nothing.
A Dan-friendly home
Their sunny, spacious ranch house in Amherst is much changed from when the D’Andreas moved in nine years ago, after their wedding.
Originally a 900-square-foot starter home, the house was expanded and made handicapped-accessible after Dan’s 2004 injury. They joke that the house is not just handicapped- friendly, it’s “Dan-friendly,” tailored to his frame, the size of the wheelchair he uses and his range of motion.
“Our goal was for me to be as independent as possible,” Dan said. “I refuse to have people come to the house [as caregivers]. That was probably hard on my wife. I want to be independent –as much as I possibly could be.”
Ask the couple about painful moments they’ve encountered outside the sanctuary of that home, and they’ll give you a litany. Of how Dan was pushed aside in the doorway of a restaurant, because his wheelchair made him slow. Or about the time their hotel, with so-called “accessible” rooms, had only a regular standing shower stall with a rim to climb over. Or about how few of Western New York’s parks allow the nature-loving Dan the kind of outdoor access he craves.
“There’s a gap out there,” Dan said, of the way disability is viewed. “I would like to see inclusion. So anywhere you go, anyone with a disability can do anything anybody else can.”
There are plenty of people who would agree with him.
About 6 million people –1.9 percent of the U. S. population –are living with paralysis of one form or another, according to the latest research by the Christopher&Dana Reeve Foundation, done in conjunction with universities, medical centers and the Centers for Disease Control. That number is more than 30 percent higher than was previously believed, the foundation reported. And nearly 1.3 million people in the country are living with a spinal-cord injury.
Melanie struggles when she sees the way the world treats her formerly strapping young husband –the petty injustices, the casual lack of concern.
People who know the couple have noticed it as well.
“What I have learned from them is how badly people treat the disabled. I see [Melanie and Dan] out, and how disrespectful people are,” said Donna Alessi, a family friend.
“They’ve been through a lot together.”
A good team
No one would have predicted this sort of road for Melanie and Dan D’Andrea.
From the time they met in May 1998, they have been inseparable. Melanie, a Dunkirk native, had lived in the Denver area for more than 20 years.
Newly single after a divorce, she decided to move back to Western New York and found an apartment in Amherst. Her next-door neighbor was a good-looking construction worker named Dan.
“Out comes Prince Charming,” recalled Melanie, of how Dan came over to help her move in.
Dan was 15 years younger than Melanie. But that didn’t seem to be an issue.
“He was rugged-looking,” said Melanie. “I thought he was older than he was. When I found out [his true age], I thought, oh no. And then it just didn’t matter.”
The pair started attending church together –Catholic Mass, where Melanie introduced Dan to a priest she admired. Dan felt himself becoming more spiritual through her influence. “I was pretty religious then,” he said. “I still talk to God every day. It might not be what he wants to hear.”
Before long the couple moved in together and then, in 2002, they married.
“Melanie had said she would never remarry –so I was surprised she changed her mind about that,” said Christine Woodbury of Clarence, Melanie’s younger sister. “Dan must be special. I don’t know that anyone else could have talked her into marriage.”
As newlyweds, the D’Andreas were the kind of couple friends would exclaim over. They complemented each other well. They laughed easily together. Each worked at a demanding job–Melanie as a nurse, Dan in construction –and supported the other’s ambitions.
“They made a good team,” said Woodbury.
The D’Andreas were the kind of couple people envy –until the day everything changed.
Tragedy strikes
It was a normal weekday in December 2004. Melanie was in the middle of a typical day in her job, as a triage nurse who worked over the phone from home.
She had just gotten off a call when the phone rang. She didn’t recognize the number on her caller ID. In her memoir, Melanie writes about what happened next:
“I knew immediately that something was off.
‘Honey I’m hurt real bad.’ Dan was crying. Now THAT was unheard of. I had seen him cry only once, at his mother’s funeral five years earlier. “I can’t move. I can’t feel anything from my chest down. I can’t move my legs. I can’t feel my feet! I’m talking on somebody’s cellphone. I can’t get to mine because I’m hurt.”
“Dan’s panic, transferred to me through the phone line, hit me like an electric current.”
Dan, then 35, had been working on a job site renovating Buffalo’s old Holling Press building. He had been standing in an elevator shaft when a plank fell from a floor above, plummeted down the shaft and landed on the back of Dan’s neck, crushing the top of his spine.
He crumpled to the ground, unable to feel anything below the middle of his chest.
He was taken to Erie County Medical Center and spent weeks in trauma care.
This was a dark time for the couple, Melanie writes in her memoir. Dan, who was usually unconscious, reacted badly to some of his medications; he would thrash around and try to pull out his IVs, and there was a chance of him hurting himself further.
“The doctor told us it was the reaction of an able-bodied young man who had the strength of an animal, being trapped inside his body,” said Melanie. “They told me early on that he would probably never walk –but that he would probably not die.”
The D’Andreas were clearly in life-changing circumstances, said attorney Terrence M. Connors, who represented them from these early days after the accident.
“He was in rough shape. [Dan] was barely conscious when we first saw him,” said Connors.
As for Melanie, Connors said, she was already focused on the reality before her.
“Right from the beginning, Melanie knew it was going to be a very difficult row to hoe for him,” Connors said. “She said to us, ‘I just want your candor. I just want you to be honest with me.’ She knew how difficult it was going to be. And not just the physical, but the emotional side of it.”
Melanie said she knew right away what she and Dan were up against.
“From the day it happened, I knew that he wasn’t going to walk again,”Melanie said. “I didn’t go through a grieving process –I went right to the reality.”
Hard to handle
After a week, Dan began to creep back to lucidity. He was in the hospital for weeks. In January 2005, the couple decided it was time to seek treatment that might give him a chance at movement.
Craig Hospital in Colorado is one of the country’s premier resources for spinal-cord injury, according to experts at the Christopher&Dana Reeve Foundation.
“If you go to the local hospital and they see two or three spinal-cord injuries a year, that’s way different from going to a major center where they see hundreds of these cases a year,” said Joe Canose, senior vice president for quality of life at the foundation, located in Short Hills, N. J.
Dan went to Craig by Lear jet. Once there, he was immersed in extensive rehab sessions, counseling, and medical treatments designed to make him as independent and mobile as possible. Some 23 percent of cases of paralysis are caused by spinal-cord injury, second only to stroke, the Reeve Foundation data shows.
Melanie, meanwhile, was facing her own troubles. As her husband progressed, she found herself having “meltdowns” in her new role as caregiver.
To take one example: in the book, she writes about how hard it was for her to handle Dan’s toileting needs, since he could not control his bladder and bowels until he learned to follow a bowel “program.” One night she bought them a takeout dinner; it passed immediately through Dan, and she spent the next several hours cleaning the bed, floor and bathroom of their apartment in Denver. As she writes:
“Imagine one minute you are having what you hope will be a romantic, cozy dinner with your husband. In the next moment, you are changing the pants of that same 200-pound man. He has just had the largest diarrhea stool of his life. Imagine having nothing available to you but your bare hands, a few towels, and a wash rag. Imagine wondering if this is the first day of the rest of your life.”
It was in these early months that Melanie began to assemble voluminous scrapbooks about their experiences. She also began writing in a series of journals –tattered memo notebooks –that gave her room to chart Dan’s progress, as well as vent her own emotions.
“There’s pressure on [the patient] to progress. And pressure is on the caregiver, to put up or shut up,” she said. “I felt that all the time –yet I wasn’t the one who was injured, so what did I have to complain about?”
Writing it all down
It was about this time that Melanie also realized that, apart from actor Christopher Reeve’s account of his paralysis, there were very few books that offered any insight into what being a caregiver and spouse of a spinal-cord-injured person was like.
“Seven years ago, I didn’t see anything,” she said.
Along the way, her thoughts grew into a plan: to write an honest account of what her journey was like. She drew from her journals, her scrapbooks and her memories.
“I felt compelled to write about it,”Melanie said. “If just one person reads it and tells me that they loved it and it helped them, I’ve reached my goal.”
At the Reeve Foundation, Canose said that people underestimate the broader impact of a paralyzing injury.
“A spinal-cord injury in a family affects the whole family,” Canose said. “There’s a lot of families that don’t [make it]. Some can’t handle it.”
For caregivers, Canose said, the difficulty of the role lies in its neverendingness.
“It’s 24/7. That’s the difference,” he said. “You’re on call all the time – to handle issues you’d rather not deal with.”
Melanie said she would like to use any proceeds she realizes from the memoir to fund equipment and programs that would help disabled people in Western New York.
Dan, too, has found a way to get past his injury and reach out a helping hand.
He has set up a charitable trust with some of the settlement he and Melanie received from his lawsuit over his injury. Dan was awarded $27 million from four insurance carriers in the settlement.
And Dan–who has not regained any significant mobility in his lower body–has taken steps to more publicly advocate on the local level about disability. He sits on an advisory board to the Amherst town government on disability issues. His trust has funded programs designed to train local governments about issues of handicapped access and sensitivity.
“My vision is more local. His is wider,” Melanie said of her husband.
A strong will
Today, the D’Andreas are coping with another difficult reality: Melanie’s recent diagnosis with leukemia.
Melanie told Dan after hearing the news from doctors, despite knowing the toll it would take. The good news is, her illness appears to be a slow-moving, chronic variety. The bad news is, they had just felt they were getting their bearings after Dan’s paralysis.
“I have a hard time keeping anything from him –painfully so,” said Melanie. “I broke it to him right away.”
Dan said that her illness is difficult for him to understand.
“It was just another thing on the pile, you know?” he said. “It’s just the kind of luck we seem to get. You don’t know what to expect next.”
As for Melanie, she figures she’ll play this hand the same way she played the one she was dealt with Dan’s accident.
With pragmatism –and a strong will.
“I had made that promise, remember?” she said. “Not to question: why us?”
“I ask that a lot,” interjects Dan, sitting by her side.
Melanie smiles at him. “You didn’t make the promise.”
THE article impacted me deeply. I felt compelled to write to the NEWS about it. The BELOW was my 'first' manuscript:
Dear Editors;
Regarding the saga of the D'Andreas in your Sunday SPOTLIGHT story of "When Life Gets Hard",
the D'Andreas had my heart, soul, and inspiration until I read about their $27,000,000.00 settlement.
The empathy levels were in overdrive, but the levels admittedly started to downshift once I saw the
Connors name mentioned. I, of course, am aware that Connors is a high-visibility injury-attorney in the
Buffalo area. Being advised two paragraphs later that D'Andrea's work-related injury culminated in a
multi-million dollar settlement, my emotional attachment dropped to neutral.
That revelation had me posturing for the position that the circumstance leading up to accident, and the
subsequent debilitating lifestyle is unfortunate, but they have ample resources at their disposal to
mitigate the pain.
There is another part of the disability world where there are many of us who do not have such resources
at their disposal to mitigate their pain. Mother Nature imposed on me, in midlife, a very very debilitating
disability which continues to be a slow-progressive degeneration type of Muscular Dystrophy. There is no
cure. As debilitating as this handicap is, I am reduced to SSDI benefits---and working part-time, to make
ends meet. With SSDI rules being what they are my part-time income is about to be diminished further
compounding the angst of making ends meet.
The disability is such that I literally no longer possess any sense of balance. And my legs are a twisting,
and a reduced-strength, mess. Over short distances I can assume the erect position and ambulate with
the aid of a reciprocal walker, but longer distances must be traversed with the aid of a battery-powered
scooter.
The family-factor is a curious one. There will be occasions where help is offered and evident, but by-and large
it postures itself in suspended-animation, awaiting my request to ask for it. And even when it is requested,
sometimes the 'bedside-manner is evident, and sometimes, it is not.
With all due respect, D'Andrea Family, you've been provided an extraordinary blessing; an extraordinary resource
to adequately address the misfortune.
Because I didn't want the 'world' to be bearing witness to this one particular 'cross' that I am contending with, I decided to delete the: "The Family-factor" paragraph from essay so that the finished-product sent to THE NEWS read as follows:
Regarding the saga of the D'Andreas in your Sunday SPOTLIGHT story of "When Life Gets Hard",
the D'Andreas had my heart, soul, and inspiration until I read about their $27,000,000.00 settlement.
The empathy levels were in overdrive, but the levels admittedly started to downshift once I saw the
Connors name mentioned. I, of course, am aware that Connors is a high-visibility injury-attorney in the
Buffalo area. Being advised two paragraphs later that D'Andrea's work-related injury culminated in a
multi-million dollar settlement, my emotional attachment dropped to neutral.
That revelation had me posturing for the position that the circumstance leading up to accident, and the
subsequent debilitating lifestyle is unfortunate, but they have ample resources at their disposal to
mitigate the pain.
There is another part of the disability world where there are many of us who do not have such resources
at their disposal to mitigate their pain. Mother Nature imposed on me, in midlife, a very very debilitating
disability which continues to be a slow-progressive degeneration type of Muscular Dystrophy. There is no
cure. As debilitating as this handicap is, I am reduced to SSDI benefits---and working part-time, to make
ends meet. With SSDI rules being what they are, my part-time income is about to be diminished further
compounding the angst of making ends meet.
My disability is such that I literally no longer possess any sense of balance. And my legs are a twisting,
and a reduced-strength, mess. Over short distances I can assume the erect position and ambulate with
the aid of a reciprocal walker, but longer distances must be traversed with the aid of a battery-powered
scooter.
With all due respect, D'Andrea Family, you've been provided an extraordinary blessing; an extraordinary resource
to adequately address the misfortune.
BELOW is what the NEWS printed Monday 3 October, in their Editorial page:
I am writing in regard to the saga of Melanie and Dan D’Andreas, which was featured in the Sept. 25 Spotlight story, “When life gets hard.” They had my heart, soul and inspiration until I read about their $27 million settlement for his work-related injury.
That revelation had me posturing to the position that the circumstances leading up to the accident and the subsequent debilitating lifestyle are unfortunate, but they have ample resources at their disposal to mitigate the pain.
There is another part of the disability world in which many of us do not have such resources at our disposal to mitigate our pain. Mother Nature imposed on me, in midlife, a very debilitating disability that continues to be a progressive degeneration type of muscular dystrophy. There is no cure. As debilitating as this handicap is, I am reduced to Social Security Disability Insurance benefits and working part time to make ends meet. With SSDI rules being what they are, my part-time income is about to be diminished, further compounding the angst of making ends meet.
My disability is such that I no longer possess any sense of balance and my twisted legs are a reduced-strength mess. Over short distances, I can assume the erect position and ambulate with the aid of a reciprocal walker, but longer distances must be traversed with the aid of a battery-powered scooter.
With all due respect, the D’Andreas family has been provided an extraordinary blessing—an extraordinary resource to adequately address the misfortune.
If I may be allowed to pull the curtain open just a tad, the family-factor is a curious one. There will be occasions where help is offered and evident, but by-and large
it postures itself in suspended-animation, awaiting my request to ask for it. And even when it is requested,
sometimes the 'bedside-manner is evident, and sometimes, it is not. Even something spontaneous and out-of-the-clear-blue; while looking me square in the eye---something like: "How are you doing?" Are you feeling alright?" "Do you need anything; CAN I GET YOU ANYTHING?" I will hear questions as these coming from strangers and acquaintances, but I will not hear these kinds of questions from family members. And least of all: Donna. She is currently in an accelerated-program in Lou-avoidance. And, of course, with me having released her, she may feel that her 'responsibility' as my partner, is significantly diminished. She is probably thinking in a relieved way, that it is no longer incumbent upon her to provide as a wife-partner should. She will 'set-up' water & milk on the kitchen table for me on the mornings that I have to get to the ECBOE. She does this because she is up already anyways to have to get to her cleaning assignments. It is there, resting on the table, awaiting me. Donna though, is long-gone; no note or expression of affection. She will be gone all day. And she will make sure she is gone long enough so that her 'responsibility' to prepare supper defaults to Andrew. Just to clear the air, in case there is some oversight on the CORE issue, if I could reasonably prepare or attain my suppers, trust me, I would. There was once-upon-a-time, myself possessing the ability to do such routine tasks. Be assured, if I, like ATLAS, could continue to carry the world on my shoulders, I would. In an embracing relationship, in a loving relationship, these gestures would certainly not be considered 'tasks'. They are in this household. Out of the seven days in the week, Donna's actual preparation of the supper---may be two days. Andrew, by-and-large, covers five or the seven days. Part of why she relinquishes the supper arrangement to Andrew, as well, has to do with the fact that she simply DOES NOT WANT TO SHARE MY COMPANY. One would think I was plagued with leprosy. It is as if I am adjudicated to solitary confinement. That is as realistic as it actually is. I have no company, no conversation, and unless I initiate a gesture like a 'good-night', none is offered. Same with a good-morning. I don't think I have heard a good-morning from anybody, in this house. And she is good at putting on the spectacle for her next set of suitors. She can display the colorful feathers as well as any peacock can---and she knows this. This is why she gets all of the attention and credit, while I, like Cinderella, lay shattered and torn, in the isolation of the 'corner'. With myself, in the words of U-2, she can be---as cold as ice. I have no idea how she is willingly conducting herself as a human being. The no-contact, the no-conversations, the no-interactivity, the no-embracing, the no-kissing, the no-hand holding, is gut-wrenching for me. This is the course-of-action which she chooses to prefer.
She is either cold, heartless, and hypocritical, or she is engaged with someone else already. For me, solitary confinement is virtually unlivable. And yet---this is the sentence I am given to serve---for my transgressions.
work still in progress...
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Saturday, September 24, 2011
White Bird Must Fly...
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
Two old friends meet again
Wearin' older faces
And talk about the places they've been~~~Michael Murphy; MAYBE THIS TIME
I just haven't been inspired to write in my journal over these last few weeks. The loss of four and one-half hours of essay writing in the "I FELT THE EARTH MOVE" entry, just took the winds right out of my sails. The essay was five and one-half hours of heart & soul. It is not like one can just 'up' and recreate the spontaneity of what one is trying to convey with the richness of metaphor, creativity, and animation.
By and large, the week up through the 17 September, 2011 was without anything of notoriety. On Saturday, 17 September 2011, I did participate in something that I was looking forward to. The complexion of the detail changed slightly, but I was still in good company, so I felt good about attending. My primary company/aide had to step away at the last minute because of a personal matter, but my secondary company/aide(and the long-time friend of my primary) was able to step in, and was always there for help, and quality-time conversations. The below is the summary that I posted on my FACEBOOK page to recognize the event---and some of the pivotal people involved.
This is a public expression of appreciation to Commander Pat Nealon of AMERICAN LEGION POST 527 of Hamburg, NY & his wife Martha for including me in the Southern Tier Wine Tasting Tour, Saturday, 17 Sept. The tour included Sparkling Ponds Winery, Quincy Cellars, and Liberty Vineyards. The considerations for my accommodations was always present and accounted for. And Todd the Bus driver, was a Smooth Operator. A salute to the Commander, his wife, and the AHS contingent. [The AHS contingent was on the diminutive side this time; being all of Martha, Marietta, Ann, and myself].
Kevin, the owner of Quincy Cellars, was a class-act. Very engaging in the effort to make sure we all were included.
Sunday 18 September 2011 had the usual ingredients that started the day off. We went to the 11:30AM Mass @ St Joseph's University Parish Church. And as we often do, Donna, Nicole, and I went to The GREEK TO ME Restaurant for a little lunch. It was nice that Nicole was sharing the Catholic Service with us. She has not been to a Catholic Mass in a very very long time. Of course, there is the Mr. Hyde side-of-me that wonders if any of THIS really matters anyway. It is the Dr. Jykell side of me which holds on to THE PROMISE that this does matter; the promise that has an accompanying hand in mine, and together, we will travel together through the ends of time. While we; Nicole mostly, is talking about experiences, the Bills game is on their TV. As we are leaving, the half-time score is 24-3, Oakland leading. I have to think that pretty much everybody resigned themselves to the fact that the exhilaration of the Opening-Day victory against Kansas City had paved its way to the reality of what Buffalo Bills football actually translates to. But!!!!!!!!! By the closing seconds of the game, the Bills will have pulled off one of the most amazing comebacks in their team-history. In the waning seconds Fitzpatrick hurls a pass into the end-zone to Jones, to give the Bills a 38-35 victory!! Facebook was abuzz for the rest of day, because of this sensation.
Tuesday 20 September, because it is a day that I am not scheduled downtown, I put together an agenda to get some tasks completed. One of them was to get over to the SSA Office to turn in my next set of pay-stubs. In accomplishing this objective, I usually will travel up Sheridan Dr. As I am making my way up Delaware Ave to Sheridan Dr., I am now observing something that is just fascinating!! Ahead of me, in the passing lane, waiting for the traffic-control light to change, is a sky-blue late-model Mustang. The passenger door window is dropped all the way down, and straddling the opening is this larger-sized dog. As all dogs do, this dog just loved having its head stuck out of the window. To assure its stability, the Canine has its right paw placed against the side-view mirror. The icing on the cake to this imagery, is that the canine is sporting WW I aviator goggles!!! What keeps my interest is that this motorist is now doing what I have to do; turn right onto Sheridan Dr. As I am watching this just a couple of car-lengths behind--along Sheridan Dr, I am starting to think; "Lou, you have to get a picture of this---this is so insanely cute!!"
I did get a cell-phone picture. It was tough to pull-off, as explained in my FACEBOOK LINK posting that reads as follows:
Check out this Canine!! The Canine is wearing WW I fighter-pilot goggles!! Not a bad picture considering I am doing this with a cell phone, on Sheridan Dr, NOON traffic, at approximately 45MPH!!!
The best way to appreciate it was to have seen it up close and personal. The picture is fairly descent considering that, as I mentioned, the picture was taken with a cell phone. There was quite a bit of traffic on Sheridan Dr as it was Noon traffic, and everybody is going around 45 MPH!! And, oh yes, I need to keep my right hand free because that is the hand that is supposed to move my right leg from peddle to brake---and visa-verse!! The picture posting LINK did create a little bit of a sensation on my FACEBOOK Wall.
So after this sensation, I get to the SSA Office, and the real-world chimes right-in on me. The SSA Office is loaded with people, so I decide I am not going to 'waste' my time. I ended up going to the SSA Office on Friday 23 September.
I really have to say something about this, too. Especially because it has been a LONG knock-down, dragged-out, battle for 6 weeks now. The reciprocal walker that I ordered from Sheridan Surgical, isn't going to be procured from Sheridan Surgical. Apparently with all of the wholesale sources they have at their disposal, nobody can provide the walker to Sheridan Surgical so it can, in turn, be purchased at the retail level. Upon learning of this, I proceed to Benson Surgical on Delaware Ave, and they have one right out on the floor---as a floor-display. I give it a road-test on the floor of Benson and I find---just-what-the-doctor-ordered. This was on Tuesday 13 September, 2011. To put the purchase through my health-insurance carrier, I need to obtain a script from my doctor stating Reciprocal Walker to aid in ambulation. Cake-walk; right?!?!? So wrong!! OUR MODEL Current health care system. You know---the one that is supposed to be the greatest in the world; the one that is so great and effective and efficient that WE DON'T NEED ANYTHING to try to improve it. The doctor; the physical therapist DOCTOR that recommended me to graduate to the walker, from two canes, to better ambulate when assuming the upright position, CANNOT write a script for me to submit to my health insurance carrier. I have to secure the Script from another specialist. Are you @#$%^&*()_+_)(*&^%$# kidding me!?!? I have been working on this with several doctors whom I will not name; I should, but I will not. THIS IS MY PLEDGE: trust me---DeGraff Wellness Center will NOT get back their LOANER until somebody writes me a SCRIPT for the Walker now on HOLD @ Benson Surgical. It is the principal of the matter. I can afford the $86.00 cost of the walker. But as a cripple, I am still working, in part, to hold down a health insurance benefit. That benefit should be covering their fair share of the costs. It should NOT be coming exclusively out of my pocket.
By Thursday, 22 September, it has now gotten absolutely ridiculous. I get a call from Benson Surgical. They have received a Script. They tell me they cannot submit it; it is not technically worded right!!! I blew up!! I told the operative at Benson---I am not the technician here, I am the customer. YOU call the writer of the Script back, and YOU tell them the technical term for the 'walker' so that BS/BC pays you. I am thinking the Script came from an operative at the DENT CLINIC; I didn't ask. I know I had put some pressure on this 'contact' as well, as a 'writer' for the Script. There is no wonder why health care is so expensive; it is so ineffective and inefficient. Fridays are always good for me. I, in a sigh of relief, received a phone call late 23 September, that my Reciprocal Walker at Banson was now finally, all set and ready to be picked-up!! Hallelujah!!!
CODEX: another manifestation of how much there is the yearning to leave; to no longer be with me, and the almost 2-score time-period we called ours, being no longer relevant, substantive, or worth continuing. Recent posting on FACEBOOK Wall.
White bird must fly; must go to find greener pastures, or at least somebody who is more agile and bountiful than I am to provide. Apparently all the amenities; all the bed & breakfasts---were lies. Or at least her suggestion of enjoyment and appreciation were lies.
White bird in a golden cage; in a land of plenty; provided residuals, provided the finer things in life such as clothing, jewelry, and being placed on a pedestal.
Still alone; still not fulfilled, still not made to feel whole.
But the white bird just sits in her cage,
growing old.She wants to so relinquish herself from me. It certainly appeared that she was enjoying ALL the creature comforts and intimacies of the bed & breakfasts and formal dinners that I made sure was part & parcel of our birthdays, our St. Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, and Anniversary celebrations. Additionally, it is important to note that these occasions were all recognized with all the spectacle AND substance that they deserved. Whatever the Mr Hyde elements and ingredients, in the relationship, that may have put a damper on the relationship, it APPEARED anyway, that the Dr. Jekyll ingredients were such that I felt confidant that we were getting beyond these briars and brambles, together.
This POSTING is as strong a Dear-John-letter, which I have seen, up to this point.
Performed by---Its A Beautiful Day
WHITE BIRD MUST FLY...
White bird,
in a golden cage,
on a winter's day,
in the rain.
White bird,
in a golden cage,
alone.
The leaves blow,
Across the long black road.
To the darkened skies,
in its rage
But the white bird just sits in her cage,
unknown.
White bird must fly
Or she will die
White bird,
dreams of the aspen trees,
with their dying leaves,
turning gold.
But the white bird just sits in her cage,
growing old.
White bird must fly or she will die.
White bird must fly or she will die.
The sunsets come, the sunsets go.
The clouds roll by,and the earth turns old.
And the young bird's eyes do always glow.
She must fly,
She must fly,
She must fly.
White bird,
In a golden cage,
On a winter's day, in the rain.
White bird,
In a golden cage alone.
White bird must fly or she will die.
White bird must fly or she will die.
White bird must fly or she will die.
There is also this posting on the Wall;
CANDLES
By Carl Dennis
If on your grandmother's birthday you burn a candle
To honor her memory, you might think of burning an extra
To honor the memory of someone who never met her,
A man who may have come to the town she lived in
Looking for work and never found it.
Picture him taking a stroll one morning,
After a month of grief with the want ads,
To refresh himself in the park before moving on.
Suppose he notices on the gravel path the shards
Of a green glass bottle that your grandmother,
Then still a girl, will be destined to step on
When she wanders barefoot away from her school picnic
If he doesn't stoop down and scoop the mess up
With the want-ad section and carry it to a trash can.
For you to burn a candle for him
You needn't suppose the cut would be a deep one,
Just deep enough to keep her at home
The night of the hay ride when she meets Helen,
Who is soon to become her dearest friend,
Whose brother George, thirty years later,
Helps your grandfather with a loan so his shoe store
Doesn't go under in the Great Depression
And his son, your father, is able to stay in school
Where his love of learning is fanned into flames,
A love he labors, later, to kindle in you.
How grateful you are for your father's efforts
Is shown by the candles you've burned for him.
But today, for a change, why not a candle
For the man whose name is unknown to you?
Take a moment to wonder whether he died at home
With friends and family or alone on the road,
On the look-out for no one to sit at his bedside
And hold his hand, the very hand
It's time for you to imagine holding.
Source: Poetry (April 2002).
I truly am not sure that she fully understands the last four lines of this poem. She subsequently remarks in the comment thread of her FACEBOOK posting how this poem had her become 'misty-eyed'. I am not sure why, because I think she missed the whole point of the poem. I can't see her getting misty-eyed---over me.
Even on my deathbed; alone again---naturally.
Must post CODEX MATERIAL---and material about the volumes of literature I now possess
for supper and evening reading!!
In the absence of people, my suppers and my after-dinner-time have, of late, become filled with a form of quality-time interactivity. This time, it is in the form of the printed media. I have procured from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC some very beautifully leather-bound, and written, history and science books. These are large, hard-covered, with the pages of a laminated gloss finish. At this point, I have been reading from The New Solar System, The World History, and The Medieval History. Some of the volumes to be included in this collection, for supper companionship, will be The Ancient Empires, and Indian Cultures.
At Mass on this Sunday, 25 September 2011, she has chosen to no longer hold my hand.
White bird MUST fly, or she will die; she apparently is convinced of this. I never thought I held her 'down' that she SHOULD HAVE TO take such flight.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Two old friends meet again
Wearin' older faces
And talk about the places they've been~~~Michael Murphy; MAYBE THIS TIME
I just haven't been inspired to write in my journal over these last few weeks. The loss of four and one-half hours of essay writing in the "I FELT THE EARTH MOVE" entry, just took the winds right out of my sails. The essay was five and one-half hours of heart & soul. It is not like one can just 'up' and recreate the spontaneity of what one is trying to convey with the richness of metaphor, creativity, and animation.
By and large, the week up through the 17 September, 2011 was without anything of notoriety. On Saturday, 17 September 2011, I did participate in something that I was looking forward to. The complexion of the detail changed slightly, but I was still in good company, so I felt good about attending. My primary company/aide had to step away at the last minute because of a personal matter, but my secondary company/aide(and the long-time friend of my primary) was able to step in, and was always there for help, and quality-time conversations. The below is the summary that I posted on my FACEBOOK page to recognize the event---and some of the pivotal people involved.
This is a public expression of appreciation to Commander Pat Nealon of AMERICAN LEGION POST 527 of Hamburg, NY & his wife Martha for including me in the Southern Tier Wine Tasting Tour, Saturday, 17 Sept. The tour included Sparkling Ponds Winery, Quincy Cellars, and Liberty Vineyards. The considerations for my accommodations was always present and accounted for. And Todd the Bus driver, was a Smooth Operator. A salute to the Commander, his wife, and the AHS contingent. [The AHS contingent was on the diminutive side this time; being all of Martha, Marietta, Ann, and myself].
Kevin, the owner of Quincy Cellars, was a class-act. Very engaging in the effort to make sure we all were included.
Sunday 18 September 2011 had the usual ingredients that started the day off. We went to the 11:30AM Mass @ St Joseph's University Parish Church. And as we often do, Donna, Nicole, and I went to The GREEK TO ME Restaurant for a little lunch. It was nice that Nicole was sharing the Catholic Service with us. She has not been to a Catholic Mass in a very very long time. Of course, there is the Mr. Hyde side-of-me that wonders if any of THIS really matters anyway. It is the Dr. Jykell side of me which holds on to THE PROMISE that this does matter; the promise that has an accompanying hand in mine, and together, we will travel together through the ends of time. While we; Nicole mostly, is talking about experiences, the Bills game is on their TV. As we are leaving, the half-time score is 24-3, Oakland leading. I have to think that pretty much everybody resigned themselves to the fact that the exhilaration of the Opening-Day victory against Kansas City had paved its way to the reality of what Buffalo Bills football actually translates to. But!!!!!!!!! By the closing seconds of the game, the Bills will have pulled off one of the most amazing comebacks in their team-history. In the waning seconds Fitzpatrick hurls a pass into the end-zone to Jones, to give the Bills a 38-35 victory!! Facebook was abuzz for the rest of day, because of this sensation.
Tuesday 20 September, because it is a day that I am not scheduled downtown, I put together an agenda to get some tasks completed. One of them was to get over to the SSA Office to turn in my next set of pay-stubs. In accomplishing this objective, I usually will travel up Sheridan Dr. As I am making my way up Delaware Ave to Sheridan Dr., I am now observing something that is just fascinating!! Ahead of me, in the passing lane, waiting for the traffic-control light to change, is a sky-blue late-model Mustang. The passenger door window is dropped all the way down, and straddling the opening is this larger-sized dog. As all dogs do, this dog just loved having its head stuck out of the window. To assure its stability, the Canine has its right paw placed against the side-view mirror. The icing on the cake to this imagery, is that the canine is sporting WW I aviator goggles!!! What keeps my interest is that this motorist is now doing what I have to do; turn right onto Sheridan Dr. As I am watching this just a couple of car-lengths behind--along Sheridan Dr, I am starting to think; "Lou, you have to get a picture of this---this is so insanely cute!!"
I did get a cell-phone picture. It was tough to pull-off, as explained in my FACEBOOK LINK posting that reads as follows:
Check out this Canine!! The Canine is wearing WW I fighter-pilot goggles!! Not a bad picture considering I am doing this with a cell phone, on Sheridan Dr, NOON traffic, at approximately 45MPH!!!
The best way to appreciate it was to have seen it up close and personal. The picture is fairly descent considering that, as I mentioned, the picture was taken with a cell phone. There was quite a bit of traffic on Sheridan Dr as it was Noon traffic, and everybody is going around 45 MPH!! And, oh yes, I need to keep my right hand free because that is the hand that is supposed to move my right leg from peddle to brake---and visa-verse!! The picture posting LINK did create a little bit of a sensation on my FACEBOOK Wall.
So after this sensation, I get to the SSA Office, and the real-world chimes right-in on me. The SSA Office is loaded with people, so I decide I am not going to 'waste' my time. I ended up going to the SSA Office on Friday 23 September.
I really have to say something about this, too. Especially because it has been a LONG knock-down, dragged-out, battle for 6 weeks now. The reciprocal walker that I ordered from Sheridan Surgical, isn't going to be procured from Sheridan Surgical. Apparently with all of the wholesale sources they have at their disposal, nobody can provide the walker to Sheridan Surgical so it can, in turn, be purchased at the retail level. Upon learning of this, I proceed to Benson Surgical on Delaware Ave, and they have one right out on the floor---as a floor-display. I give it a road-test on the floor of Benson and I find---just-what-the-doctor-ordered. This was on Tuesday 13 September, 2011. To put the purchase through my health-insurance carrier, I need to obtain a script from my doctor stating Reciprocal Walker to aid in ambulation. Cake-walk; right?!?!? So wrong!! OUR MODEL Current health care system. You know---the one that is supposed to be the greatest in the world; the one that is so great and effective and efficient that WE DON'T NEED ANYTHING to try to improve it. The doctor; the physical therapist DOCTOR that recommended me to graduate to the walker, from two canes, to better ambulate when assuming the upright position, CANNOT write a script for me to submit to my health insurance carrier. I have to secure the Script from another specialist. Are you @#$%^&*()_+_)(*&^%$# kidding me!?!? I have been working on this with several doctors whom I will not name; I should, but I will not. THIS IS MY PLEDGE: trust me---DeGraff Wellness Center will NOT get back their LOANER until somebody writes me a SCRIPT for the Walker now on HOLD @ Benson Surgical. It is the principal of the matter. I can afford the $86.00 cost of the walker. But as a cripple, I am still working, in part, to hold down a health insurance benefit. That benefit should be covering their fair share of the costs. It should NOT be coming exclusively out of my pocket.
By Thursday, 22 September, it has now gotten absolutely ridiculous. I get a call from Benson Surgical. They have received a Script. They tell me they cannot submit it; it is not technically worded right!!! I blew up!! I told the operative at Benson---I am not the technician here, I am the customer. YOU call the writer of the Script back, and YOU tell them the technical term for the 'walker' so that BS/BC pays you. I am thinking the Script came from an operative at the DENT CLINIC; I didn't ask. I know I had put some pressure on this 'contact' as well, as a 'writer' for the Script. There is no wonder why health care is so expensive; it is so ineffective and inefficient. Fridays are always good for me. I, in a sigh of relief, received a phone call late 23 September, that my Reciprocal Walker at Banson was now finally, all set and ready to be picked-up!! Hallelujah!!!
CODEX: another manifestation of how much there is the yearning to leave; to no longer be with me, and the almost 2-score time-period we called ours, being no longer relevant, substantive, or worth continuing. Recent posting on FACEBOOK Wall.
White bird must fly; must go to find greener pastures, or at least somebody who is more agile and bountiful than I am to provide. Apparently all the amenities; all the bed & breakfasts---were lies. Or at least her suggestion of enjoyment and appreciation were lies.
White bird in a golden cage; in a land of plenty; provided residuals, provided the finer things in life such as clothing, jewelry, and being placed on a pedestal.
Still alone; still not fulfilled, still not made to feel whole.
But the white bird just sits in her cage,
growing old.She wants to so relinquish herself from me. It certainly appeared that she was enjoying ALL the creature comforts and intimacies of the bed & breakfasts and formal dinners that I made sure was part & parcel of our birthdays, our St. Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, and Anniversary celebrations. Additionally, it is important to note that these occasions were all recognized with all the spectacle AND substance that they deserved. Whatever the Mr Hyde elements and ingredients, in the relationship, that may have put a damper on the relationship, it APPEARED anyway, that the Dr. Jekyll ingredients were such that I felt confidant that we were getting beyond these briars and brambles, together.
This POSTING is as strong a Dear-John-letter, which I have seen, up to this point.
Performed by---Its A Beautiful Day
WHITE BIRD MUST FLY...
White bird,
in a golden cage,
on a winter's day,
in the rain.
White bird,
in a golden cage,
alone.
The leaves blow,
Across the long black road.
To the darkened skies,
in its rage
But the white bird just sits in her cage,
unknown.
White bird must fly
Or she will die
White bird,
dreams of the aspen trees,
with their dying leaves,
turning gold.
But the white bird just sits in her cage,
growing old.
White bird must fly or she will die.
White bird must fly or she will die.
The sunsets come, the sunsets go.
The clouds roll by,and the earth turns old.
And the young bird's eyes do always glow.
She must fly,
She must fly,
She must fly.
White bird,
In a golden cage,
On a winter's day, in the rain.
White bird,
In a golden cage alone.
White bird must fly or she will die.
White bird must fly or she will die.
White bird must fly or she will die.
There is also this posting on the Wall;
CANDLES
By Carl Dennis
If on your grandmother's birthday you burn a candle
To honor her memory, you might think of burning an extra
To honor the memory of someone who never met her,
A man who may have come to the town she lived in
Looking for work and never found it.
Picture him taking a stroll one morning,
After a month of grief with the want ads,
To refresh himself in the park before moving on.
Suppose he notices on the gravel path the shards
Of a green glass bottle that your grandmother,
Then still a girl, will be destined to step on
When she wanders barefoot away from her school picnic
If he doesn't stoop down and scoop the mess up
With the want-ad section and carry it to a trash can.
For you to burn a candle for him
You needn't suppose the cut would be a deep one,
Just deep enough to keep her at home
The night of the hay ride when she meets Helen,
Who is soon to become her dearest friend,
Whose brother George, thirty years later,
Helps your grandfather with a loan so his shoe store
Doesn't go under in the Great Depression
And his son, your father, is able to stay in school
Where his love of learning is fanned into flames,
A love he labors, later, to kindle in you.
How grateful you are for your father's efforts
Is shown by the candles you've burned for him.
But today, for a change, why not a candle
For the man whose name is unknown to you?
Take a moment to wonder whether he died at home
With friends and family or alone on the road,
On the look-out for no one to sit at his bedside
And hold his hand, the very hand
It's time for you to imagine holding.
Source: Poetry (April 2002).
I truly am not sure that she fully understands the last four lines of this poem. She subsequently remarks in the comment thread of her FACEBOOK posting how this poem had her become 'misty-eyed'. I am not sure why, because I think she missed the whole point of the poem. I can't see her getting misty-eyed---over me.
Even on my deathbed; alone again---naturally.
Must post CODEX MATERIAL---and material about the volumes of literature I now possess
for supper and evening reading!!
In the absence of people, my suppers and my after-dinner-time have, of late, become filled with a form of quality-time interactivity. This time, it is in the form of the printed media. I have procured from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC some very beautifully leather-bound, and written, history and science books. These are large, hard-covered, with the pages of a laminated gloss finish. At this point, I have been reading from The New Solar System, The World History, and The Medieval History. Some of the volumes to be included in this collection, for supper companionship, will be The Ancient Empires, and Indian Cultures.
At Mass on this Sunday, 25 September 2011, she has chosen to no longer hold my hand.
White bird MUST fly, or she will die; she apparently is convinced of this. I never thought I held her 'down' that she SHOULD HAVE TO take such flight.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
Saturday, September 3, 2011
I Felt The Earth Move
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
...I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down
I just lose control
Down to my very soul
I get hot and cold all over~~~Carol King; I Feel The Earth Move
Lou Marconi
I don't know about anybody else!!!!!!!!!!!!! But I just felt a TREMOR while writing an email to a US District Court Judge!!! This is legitimate!! Will have to check with the NEWS---on this one. I wonder if our 'celebrated' Earthquake Detection facilities at the UB NORTH CAMPUS even has this registered. The TECTONIC PLATES~~~have shifted!!
EPICENTER RICHMOND, VA!!!!!!!!!!! 5.8 Magnitude on the REICHTER SCALE!!!!!!!
Like · · August 23 at 2:20pm
Never felt anything like it!!!!!!!!!!!
Like · · August 23 at 2:21pm
Lou Marconi
It truly was the most unique experience I had ever felt in my life. At proximately 2:00PM of Tuesday 23 August 2011, I felt the gentle vibration of the floor as I was sitting at the kitchen table of our house. It was gentle; it was not earth shattering. My first impulse was to think the house was moving and swaying because a gust of wind---will do that. But, there was no gust of wind. It was another lazy, hazy day of summer. After this nano-second analysis filtered through my mind, I realized---Lou~~~you are bearing witness to your first-ever-earthquake. Somewhere, out there, a damned earthquake just took place. In coming to terms with this revelation; this completely unique experience, I decided that since I was on the computer writing a Letter of Recommendation(Codex;~~~, as of this writing, still hasn't), I would put out some commentary about it, to see if I was alone in the my world, or was it shared. The above italicized, is the postings that I placed on my FACEBOOK Wall. Lo-and-behold, John Lochbaum, vacationing in NC, replies that he felt something, as well!! So I took a time-out from my task, and TABBED over to a couple of News web-sites. Sure enough, the epicenter was Louisa, Virginia and it was a 5.8 seismic-reading-earthquake. The tectonic plates were on the move, and I was on a little bit of that magic-carpet-ride!! And I will even venture this. What was little-mentioned in this part of the world was that the evening of the 22nd-going-into-the-23rd, there was an earthquake of some significance in the Colorado area of the Rocky Mountains. My thinking on this is that whatever underground tectonic plate shifts, and plate tensions were in play, revealed a flawed East Coast Continental shelf plate that domino-effect shifted, bringing about our Unique-Experience.
Donna Marconi
"CREATE YOUR OWN LIFE AND THAN GO OUT AND LIVE IT."
"Make every day count. Appreciate every moment and take from it everything that you possibly can for you may never be able to experience it again."
Every Things Happens for a Reason.
Mary Ellen Carges likes this.
Wall Photos
When you walk into a Dance On the Wild Side for the first time you are taking a very courageous and powerful step in your life! Those who come know about being brave, They know about taking charge of their lives and they know about discovering their own power. They choose empowerment over all else - and that's living!! And the tribe of participants you meet - well that's the best part!!
~ Wild Woman
They choose empowerment---over all else(at everybody else's expense??)---and that is living!?!? Is it??? My God, if you are in that much a NEED to demonstrate strength and superiority---in the words of the late 50's/early 60's tagline for the TEXACO OIL Company Fleet of tanker trucks---"Sound the horn, and the road is yours."
so much more is SOMEWHERE~~~Now Lost
Two weeks of reflection;
Damned it.
---[-=@
hickok
The Promise
...I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down
I feel the earth move under my feet
I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down
I just lose control
Down to my very soul
I get hot and cold all over~~~Carol King; I Feel The Earth Move
Lou Marconi
I don't know about anybody else!!!!!!!!!!!!! But I just felt a TREMOR while writing an email to a US District Court Judge!!! This is legitimate!! Will have to check with the NEWS---on this one. I wonder if our 'celebrated' Earthquake Detection facilities at the UB NORTH CAMPUS even has this registered. The TECTONIC PLATES~~~have shifted!!
EPICENTER RICHMOND, VA!!!!!!!!!!! 5.8 Magnitude on the REICHTER SCALE!!!!!!!
Like · · August 23 at 2:20pm
Never felt anything like it!!!!!!!!!!!
Like · · August 23 at 2:21pm
Lou Marconi
It truly was the most unique experience I had ever felt in my life. At proximately 2:00PM of Tuesday 23 August 2011, I felt the gentle vibration of the floor as I was sitting at the kitchen table of our house. It was gentle; it was not earth shattering. My first impulse was to think the house was moving and swaying because a gust of wind---will do that. But, there was no gust of wind. It was another lazy, hazy day of summer. After this nano-second analysis filtered through my mind, I realized---Lou~~~you are bearing witness to your first-ever-earthquake. Somewhere, out there, a damned earthquake just took place. In coming to terms with this revelation; this completely unique experience, I decided that since I was on the computer writing a Letter of Recommendation(Codex;~~~, as of this writing, still hasn't), I would put out some commentary about it, to see if I was alone in the my world, or was it shared. The above italicized, is the postings that I placed on my FACEBOOK Wall. Lo-and-behold, John Lochbaum, vacationing in NC, replies that he felt something, as well!! So I took a time-out from my task, and TABBED over to a couple of News web-sites. Sure enough, the epicenter was Louisa, Virginia and it was a 5.8 seismic-reading-earthquake. The tectonic plates were on the move, and I was on a little bit of that magic-carpet-ride!! And I will even venture this. What was little-mentioned in this part of the world was that the evening of the 22nd-going-into-the-23rd, there was an earthquake of some significance in the Colorado area of the Rocky Mountains. My thinking on this is that whatever underground tectonic plate shifts, and plate tensions were in play, revealed a flawed East Coast Continental shelf plate that domino-effect shifted, bringing about our Unique-Experience.
Donna Marconi
"CREATE YOUR OWN LIFE AND THAN GO OUT AND LIVE IT."
"Make every day count. Appreciate every moment and take from it everything that you possibly can for you may never be able to experience it again."
Every Things Happens for a Reason.
Mary Ellen Carges likes this.
Wall Photos
When you walk into a Dance On the Wild Side for the first time you are taking a very courageous and powerful step in your life! Those who come know about being brave, They know about taking charge of their lives and they know about discovering their own power. They choose empowerment over all else - and that's living!! And the tribe of participants you meet - well that's the best part!!
~ Wild Woman
They choose empowerment---over all else(at everybody else's expense??)---and that is living!?!? Is it??? My God, if you are in that much a NEED to demonstrate strength and superiority---in the words of the late 50's/early 60's tagline for the TEXACO OIL Company Fleet of tanker trucks---"Sound the horn, and the road is yours."
so much more is SOMEWHERE~~~Now Lost
Two weeks of reflection;
Damned it.
---[-=@
hickok
The Promise
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Hospital Stay, I Wasn't Counting On, Ended Up In The Cards.
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show...(the opening lines of David Copperfield as written by Charles Dickens;inspired by MTM). Or at least this ACCOUNT will, perhaps, have a reflection on whether I'm going to be the hero in my own life.
...If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock,
I am an island~~~Simon And Garfunkel;I Am A Rock
The high-light of this week, was supposed to be Thursday, 18 August 2011. This would be the day that I was to appear at the second floor offices in the Buffalo General Hospital of neurosurgeon Dr. Robert J. Plunkett Jr. After a series of consultative visits, it was decided that I would do a trial placement of baclofen as a spinal injection. The trial was to see how my body would react to baclofen being placed directly into my spine, instead of being taken orally. MEDTRONICS manufactures a hockey-puck sized PUMP, which is surgically placed in the lower side of the abdomen and has a tube that sends small doses of baclofen into your nervous system through the lower spinal injection area. Before we were going to go through all of this surgical machinations, the Doctor wanted to see how I reacted to a needle-injected dosage of baclofen, on a trail basis, where he and his assistant Dr Susan Bennett could observe my reaction to this trial injection. This injection and subsequent observation, was to take place throughout the late-morning and into the afternoon of Thursday. They felt confident that this window of observation would give them a pretty good understanding if I was a 'good-candidate' for this baclofen-pump.
The objective of this course-of-action, the placing of this pump internally, was to see if this muscle-relaxant-agent, baclofen, would aid in, at least partially correcting the acute twisting inward of my two feet when I would, with the aid of my reciprocal walker, assume the erect position, and attempt to ambulate. In the process, my two feet currently twist excruciatingly inward, to the point where the left foot, would continue the twisting, and almost point toward the back.
The concern?? Baclofen is not a drug for everybody. It is a muscle-relaxant. For some people, apparently it works on the targeted area, without any after-effects on the person that is taking the drug. For me, the case is different. I have a history with baclofen, and it isn't a user-friendly one. Early-on in the medical profession's effort to try to help me better manage some of the pain that accompanies this spastic paraplegia that I am dealing with, Dr Carolyn Warner of the MDA Clinic, then headquartered at the ECMC, prescribed baclofen for me. This, of course, would be taken orally. It didn't work because I was plagued with side-effects. I was constantly groggy. It affected me immediately at work. Operating machinery and tow-motors was a constant challenge. I did not want to hurt or injure myself or anybody else, but I didn't want to reveal to management that I was incapable of doing my work, either. Besides the grogginess, my legs just felt like mush. I didn't have my canes yet, so my footing was always wobbly. Needless to say, we had to make a change on that medication, in a hurry. We shifted from baclofen, over to zanoflex. I have been using zanoflex---ever since. It does have a drowsiness effect to it, but not as drastic. I take the zanoflex at night, so I don't have to contend with the downsides of the drowsiness. It doesn't turn my legs to mush either. But then again, whatever spasticity it may be addressing---is nominal, at best.
Which, in turn, brings us back to baclofen---and the baclofen-pump. To start with, MEDTRONICS is only manufacturing a baclofen-pump. There is no zanofelx-pump on the market. The baclofen-pump held out the promise of spasticity relief, with no side-effects because of the more measured and direct application. Always trying to see the world in a better light, as seeing the glass half-full, and prayerfully, that this just may give me a better-day, I agreed to the trial. To illustrate how confident I thought all of this was going to work out, when my brother Victor asked me, subsequent to this ordeal, why he did not know anything about this, I simply replied---"Vic, I had full confidence that all of this would go picture-perfect; that there would be no need to worry or alarm anybody."
It is now late-morning of Thursday, and Doctor Plunkett, via needle, injects the baclofen into the spine. Again, by not taking this orally, it is supposed to bypass my brain area so I am not suppose to sustain the after-effects as in my early experiences with the drug. After a one-half-hour recovery period, Doctor Bennett wants me to attempt my first test. It pretty much goes-off, without a hitch. I have to get off the gurney and get myself onto my scooter that she has now wheeled near me. This is a good test, because even as there is economy-of-movement in the maneuver to slipping myself into my scooter, there is one KEY element that insists that I still have enough muscle strength to pull off the task. At one point I HAVE to get the right feet elevated the three inches needed to get the right-foot onto the floor-board so I can ease myself into the sitting position. So-far; so good. We do a couple more 'tests' with the reciprocating walker, then the Doctors tell Donna & I to take a little break, and to go down to the lobby-area for a snack. It is at this point, and I did not want to send up a flare yet so I did not mention this to Donna. But while I was waiting for Donna to return with the snacks, I was reading my TIME magazine. As I am holding the TIME, reading it, I begin to notice my hands wanting to let the magazine go; that I had to make a concerted effort to hold onto the magazine. I thought: hmmm, you haven't really eaten yet--you are hungry---you will be fine once you get some energy restoration, through food intake. After this, we head back to the second-floor offices for more strength-test assessments, and more evaluation on how well I am doing with reciprocal walker manipulation, and reciprocal walker-and-scooter transitions. Before I do that, I decide I am going to go to the restroom. I receive my first two yellow-card warnings that this may not end up going as planned. The first is the struggle to alight the scooter, drop-my-draws, and get myself onto the commode. I never had to struggle like this, with the transitions, to effect this everyday-function. The second yellow-card is the voiding, itself. I certainly 'feel' the urgency to 'go'. But very little is happening. Getting myself out of the rest-room is an equally concerning struggle. I did mention these developments to Dr Bennett. She was still cautiously optimistic. We went through more strength-tests, and more transition tests with my mobility equipment. A more visible degree of effort and out-right struggle was beginning to manifest itself.
After breaking for lunch, a test-review-meeting was set up to include both Drs. Bennett and Plunkett. It was after the lunch break, that I got my first hint I was IN-TROUBLE. I again went to the restroom because I still had this sense of urgency. The struggles to effect this function were more acute than the last time, while the voiding was still sluggish. The red-flag-semaphore??? I had to call-out to have Donna come into the rest-room and assist getting myself redressed, before exiting.
By 15:00PM, I can't even transition the mobility equipment any more. And I am scoring 'zeros' on my ability to lift my legs, while sitting, or moving them laterally. At this point Dr Plunkett, has his resident, Dr Berg, come into the office to start the admission process.
I started crying. I failed; I simply failed. I had the highest expectations, and I was embarrassed that I was not better than the medicine.
You want to talk about a 'life-style' alteration, I was about to get put into an environment radically different from the sweet, sweet, nobleness of home. When I am in my home, upstairs at bedtime, and I am now removed of my footwear, if I have to get anywhere, I simply crawl, to my objective. Not in the hospital. This means I cannot get to the restroom. As a consequence, I am attached to a catheter for the first time in my life. The afternoon nurse, Susan Cipolla, has excellent bed-side manners, and is very amiable in getting me to feel as comfortable as possible, with the set of circumstances I now find myself having to accept.
The experience was physically, emotionally, and mentally draining. And I think Susan readily recognized how disillusioned my disposition revealed. On the one hand, there was the REAL possibility of correcting SOME of the twisting inwardness of my two feet when I would try to ambulate with my reciprocating walker. On the other hand, I had become so literally drained of ALL vestiges of strength, that I feared my body may have morphed into a perpetually catatonic, wet-noodle state. The spastic paraplegia has involved me enough, already. I certainly did not want to be reduced to a totally bed-ridden handicap person.
After she 'registered' me, and set up the catheter, she then placed these 'wraps' around my legs that, once activated by a bed-side machine, were supposed to 'massage' my lower-legs. While I truly gave these the benefit-of-the-doubt, as I was heading into the evening, where I had a two-hour phone conversation with my brother Dominic, and then a brief good-night conversation with Donna, I decided I was just going to have to speak-up to the night-nurse, Kara. By now it was 23:00PM. And these 'wraps' were excruciating. If they were supposed to massage; they weren't. The only feeling my legs now had, was total pain. I had been thinking---Lou, it is not likely you are going to sleep anyway, because you are so anxious about all that has unfolded already. If you don't ask for these to be removed, they are going to be amputating your legs, Friday. Kara admitted that these leg-massagers get a mixed-review. She was very willing to remove them. While I still could not move any part of my legs, I was relieved that the pain was dissipating.
As Thursday was now becoming Friday, I would fade in and out of sleep. I never fully fell into a continued sleep because in the middle of the night, even at Buffalo General Hospital, there is always some type of bells & whistles going off. It is 01:20AM and the older gentleman in the bed next to me is having a rough-go-of-it. His moaning wakes me up. Great!! His TV is still on. I know he can't be watching it---it is an infomercial, selling vacuum cleaners!! I call over to him---no response. Subsequently, I red-lighted Kara into the room, and she obliges my request, and turns off Ocie's television.
As It is now progressing into the early morning hours I still had no control over my legs. The upper body was starting to gain some of my strength back, but below the hips; dead-to-right---no strength or ability to move at all.
I wanted to keep an open-mind to the possibility of a legitimate remedy, so I took a chance on this trial. They cautioned that if it didn't go to plan, the doctor would admit me for 'the-night', for observation. "Easy for 'you' to say!!" For a person as impaired as I am, functioning in an 'away' stadium, took away ALL of my logistical 'props' that help to get me through each day.
As daylight was starting to usher in the dawn of a Good Friday, I was going to do whatever I had to, to get out-of-Dodge. Even as I may have been less than Lou Marconi, I was going to do whatever I had to, to convince the Doctor, and his interns, that I was good enough to get released. I wasn't staying there, another day. I still felt a light-headedness, but I wasn't going to admit it. I figured if I could demonstrate the ability to get my boots on, by myself, then ambulate with the walker to the bathroom to void, and then get back to the bed, they would draw-up the paperwork to release me. In doing so, the physical therapist thought I 'looked' good, so he said he would draw up the release papers. He then drew the curtains closed to allow me to sponge-bath and dress myself. Dressing was a challenge because their bedroom surroundings in the hospital do not possess all of the 'props' that exist on my side of the bed at home, which allows me to cheat mother-nature and dress on my own. As Friday is now moving along into the afternoon, I am able to call Donna from her work assignment location in North Buffalo, to now come and pick me up. I was able to load the scooter into the van while the releasing nurse watched. I was then able to reciprocal-walker myself to the driver's door where I was capable of 'lifting' myself into my van. Finally, I was now comfortably at home, in the confines of 38 Kenwood Rd.
I must say that I am grateful. By the Grace of God, the prayers and thoughts, on my behalf, have been answered. As of this writing, I am feeling very good; thank you very much!!
A special thank-you goes out to Chaplain Deacon Norm. A Roman Catholic himself, just before leaving, we prayed together, and he then gave me The Holy Eucharist. And I am not lying. The loneliness that had so thoroughly been haunting me up to this point of Friday while still at the hospital---had been lifted from me. My heart, my soul, and my inspiration, had once again, lifted me from the disillusionment that had befallen me.
Baclofen; Beelzebub.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
...If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock,
I am an island~~~Simon And Garfunkel;I Am A Rock
The high-light of this week, was supposed to be Thursday, 18 August 2011. This would be the day that I was to appear at the second floor offices in the Buffalo General Hospital of neurosurgeon Dr. Robert J. Plunkett Jr. After a series of consultative visits, it was decided that I would do a trial placement of baclofen as a spinal injection. The trial was to see how my body would react to baclofen being placed directly into my spine, instead of being taken orally. MEDTRONICS manufactures a hockey-puck sized PUMP, which is surgically placed in the lower side of the abdomen and has a tube that sends small doses of baclofen into your nervous system through the lower spinal injection area. Before we were going to go through all of this surgical machinations, the Doctor wanted to see how I reacted to a needle-injected dosage of baclofen, on a trail basis, where he and his assistant Dr Susan Bennett could observe my reaction to this trial injection. This injection and subsequent observation, was to take place throughout the late-morning and into the afternoon of Thursday. They felt confident that this window of observation would give them a pretty good understanding if I was a 'good-candidate' for this baclofen-pump.
The objective of this course-of-action, the placing of this pump internally, was to see if this muscle-relaxant-agent, baclofen, would aid in, at least partially correcting the acute twisting inward of my two feet when I would, with the aid of my reciprocal walker, assume the erect position, and attempt to ambulate. In the process, my two feet currently twist excruciatingly inward, to the point where the left foot, would continue the twisting, and almost point toward the back.
The concern?? Baclofen is not a drug for everybody. It is a muscle-relaxant. For some people, apparently it works on the targeted area, without any after-effects on the person that is taking the drug. For me, the case is different. I have a history with baclofen, and it isn't a user-friendly one. Early-on in the medical profession's effort to try to help me better manage some of the pain that accompanies this spastic paraplegia that I am dealing with, Dr Carolyn Warner of the MDA Clinic, then headquartered at the ECMC, prescribed baclofen for me. This, of course, would be taken orally. It didn't work because I was plagued with side-effects. I was constantly groggy. It affected me immediately at work. Operating machinery and tow-motors was a constant challenge. I did not want to hurt or injure myself or anybody else, but I didn't want to reveal to management that I was incapable of doing my work, either. Besides the grogginess, my legs just felt like mush. I didn't have my canes yet, so my footing was always wobbly. Needless to say, we had to make a change on that medication, in a hurry. We shifted from baclofen, over to zanoflex. I have been using zanoflex---ever since. It does have a drowsiness effect to it, but not as drastic. I take the zanoflex at night, so I don't have to contend with the downsides of the drowsiness. It doesn't turn my legs to mush either. But then again, whatever spasticity it may be addressing---is nominal, at best.
Which, in turn, brings us back to baclofen---and the baclofen-pump. To start with, MEDTRONICS is only manufacturing a baclofen-pump. There is no zanofelx-pump on the market. The baclofen-pump held out the promise of spasticity relief, with no side-effects because of the more measured and direct application. Always trying to see the world in a better light, as seeing the glass half-full, and prayerfully, that this just may give me a better-day, I agreed to the trial. To illustrate how confident I thought all of this was going to work out, when my brother Victor asked me, subsequent to this ordeal, why he did not know anything about this, I simply replied---"Vic, I had full confidence that all of this would go picture-perfect; that there would be no need to worry or alarm anybody."
It is now late-morning of Thursday, and Doctor Plunkett, via needle, injects the baclofen into the spine. Again, by not taking this orally, it is supposed to bypass my brain area so I am not suppose to sustain the after-effects as in my early experiences with the drug. After a one-half-hour recovery period, Doctor Bennett wants me to attempt my first test. It pretty much goes-off, without a hitch. I have to get off the gurney and get myself onto my scooter that she has now wheeled near me. This is a good test, because even as there is economy-of-movement in the maneuver to slipping myself into my scooter, there is one KEY element that insists that I still have enough muscle strength to pull off the task. At one point I HAVE to get the right feet elevated the three inches needed to get the right-foot onto the floor-board so I can ease myself into the sitting position. So-far; so good. We do a couple more 'tests' with the reciprocating walker, then the Doctors tell Donna & I to take a little break, and to go down to the lobby-area for a snack. It is at this point, and I did not want to send up a flare yet so I did not mention this to Donna. But while I was waiting for Donna to return with the snacks, I was reading my TIME magazine. As I am holding the TIME, reading it, I begin to notice my hands wanting to let the magazine go; that I had to make a concerted effort to hold onto the magazine. I thought: hmmm, you haven't really eaten yet--you are hungry---you will be fine once you get some energy restoration, through food intake. After this, we head back to the second-floor offices for more strength-test assessments, and more evaluation on how well I am doing with reciprocal walker manipulation, and reciprocal walker-and-scooter transitions. Before I do that, I decide I am going to go to the restroom. I receive my first two yellow-card warnings that this may not end up going as planned. The first is the struggle to alight the scooter, drop-my-draws, and get myself onto the commode. I never had to struggle like this, with the transitions, to effect this everyday-function. The second yellow-card is the voiding, itself. I certainly 'feel' the urgency to 'go'. But very little is happening. Getting myself out of the rest-room is an equally concerning struggle. I did mention these developments to Dr Bennett. She was still cautiously optimistic. We went through more strength-tests, and more transition tests with my mobility equipment. A more visible degree of effort and out-right struggle was beginning to manifest itself.
After breaking for lunch, a test-review-meeting was set up to include both Drs. Bennett and Plunkett. It was after the lunch break, that I got my first hint I was IN-TROUBLE. I again went to the restroom because I still had this sense of urgency. The struggles to effect this function were more acute than the last time, while the voiding was still sluggish. The red-flag-semaphore??? I had to call-out to have Donna come into the rest-room and assist getting myself redressed, before exiting.
By 15:00PM, I can't even transition the mobility equipment any more. And I am scoring 'zeros' on my ability to lift my legs, while sitting, or moving them laterally. At this point Dr Plunkett, has his resident, Dr Berg, come into the office to start the admission process.
I started crying. I failed; I simply failed. I had the highest expectations, and I was embarrassed that I was not better than the medicine.
You want to talk about a 'life-style' alteration, I was about to get put into an environment radically different from the sweet, sweet, nobleness of home. When I am in my home, upstairs at bedtime, and I am now removed of my footwear, if I have to get anywhere, I simply crawl, to my objective. Not in the hospital. This means I cannot get to the restroom. As a consequence, I am attached to a catheter for the first time in my life. The afternoon nurse, Susan Cipolla, has excellent bed-side manners, and is very amiable in getting me to feel as comfortable as possible, with the set of circumstances I now find myself having to accept.
The experience was physically, emotionally, and mentally draining. And I think Susan readily recognized how disillusioned my disposition revealed. On the one hand, there was the REAL possibility of correcting SOME of the twisting inwardness of my two feet when I would try to ambulate with my reciprocating walker. On the other hand, I had become so literally drained of ALL vestiges of strength, that I feared my body may have morphed into a perpetually catatonic, wet-noodle state. The spastic paraplegia has involved me enough, already. I certainly did not want to be reduced to a totally bed-ridden handicap person.
After she 'registered' me, and set up the catheter, she then placed these 'wraps' around my legs that, once activated by a bed-side machine, were supposed to 'massage' my lower-legs. While I truly gave these the benefit-of-the-doubt, as I was heading into the evening, where I had a two-hour phone conversation with my brother Dominic, and then a brief good-night conversation with Donna, I decided I was just going to have to speak-up to the night-nurse, Kara. By now it was 23:00PM. And these 'wraps' were excruciating. If they were supposed to massage; they weren't. The only feeling my legs now had, was total pain. I had been thinking---Lou, it is not likely you are going to sleep anyway, because you are so anxious about all that has unfolded already. If you don't ask for these to be removed, they are going to be amputating your legs, Friday. Kara admitted that these leg-massagers get a mixed-review. She was very willing to remove them. While I still could not move any part of my legs, I was relieved that the pain was dissipating.
As Thursday was now becoming Friday, I would fade in and out of sleep. I never fully fell into a continued sleep because in the middle of the night, even at Buffalo General Hospital, there is always some type of bells & whistles going off. It is 01:20AM and the older gentleman in the bed next to me is having a rough-go-of-it. His moaning wakes me up. Great!! His TV is still on. I know he can't be watching it---it is an infomercial, selling vacuum cleaners!! I call over to him---no response. Subsequently, I red-lighted Kara into the room, and she obliges my request, and turns off Ocie's television.
As It is now progressing into the early morning hours I still had no control over my legs. The upper body was starting to gain some of my strength back, but below the hips; dead-to-right---no strength or ability to move at all.
I wanted to keep an open-mind to the possibility of a legitimate remedy, so I took a chance on this trial. They cautioned that if it didn't go to plan, the doctor would admit me for 'the-night', for observation. "Easy for 'you' to say!!" For a person as impaired as I am, functioning in an 'away' stadium, took away ALL of my logistical 'props' that help to get me through each day.
As daylight was starting to usher in the dawn of a Good Friday, I was going to do whatever I had to, to get out-of-Dodge. Even as I may have been less than Lou Marconi, I was going to do whatever I had to, to convince the Doctor, and his interns, that I was good enough to get released. I wasn't staying there, another day. I still felt a light-headedness, but I wasn't going to admit it. I figured if I could demonstrate the ability to get my boots on, by myself, then ambulate with the walker to the bathroom to void, and then get back to the bed, they would draw-up the paperwork to release me. In doing so, the physical therapist thought I 'looked' good, so he said he would draw up the release papers. He then drew the curtains closed to allow me to sponge-bath and dress myself. Dressing was a challenge because their bedroom surroundings in the hospital do not possess all of the 'props' that exist on my side of the bed at home, which allows me to cheat mother-nature and dress on my own. As Friday is now moving along into the afternoon, I am able to call Donna from her work assignment location in North Buffalo, to now come and pick me up. I was able to load the scooter into the van while the releasing nurse watched. I was then able to reciprocal-walker myself to the driver's door where I was capable of 'lifting' myself into my van. Finally, I was now comfortably at home, in the confines of 38 Kenwood Rd.
I must say that I am grateful. By the Grace of God, the prayers and thoughts, on my behalf, have been answered. As of this writing, I am feeling very good; thank you very much!!
A special thank-you goes out to Chaplain Deacon Norm. A Roman Catholic himself, just before leaving, we prayed together, and he then gave me The Holy Eucharist. And I am not lying. The loneliness that had so thoroughly been haunting me up to this point of Friday while still at the hospital---had been lifted from me. My heart, my soul, and my inspiration, had once again, lifted me from the disillusionment that had befallen me.
Baclofen; Beelzebub.
--{-=@
Hickok
The Promise
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