True Love Forever, Interrupted
Dear Mr. Cassidy,
It has recently come to my attention that I neglected to end our relationship that I alone started, and that I alone declared exclusive, in 1977. Upon review of my journals, dating back to your time on the Hardy Boys, I noted that I pledged my true love forever (TLF) to you many, many times. I even wrote you letters declaring this.
I am aware that you likely never got these missives, on which I used my best Palmer Method penmanship. I am sure that whoever ran your fan club at that time was threatened by my…
Cardiac Athletes
With the support of strangers who became friends
Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of stories highlighting just a few members of the global network, Cardiac Athletes. (© Cardiac Athletes 2020 |All Right Reserved) Three runners/cyclists are included in this article. Their stories contain some descriptions of their cardiac event. If you recognize any of these symptoms in yourself, or a loved one, please seek immediate medical attention.
When a Massachusetts runner had a heart attack after a 10k in August 2016, he thought maybe his running days were behind him.
He’d lost consciousness repeatedly in a friend’s driveway, but surmised he had heat exhaustion…
“Your skin is made of paper and your bones are made of glass,” — my friend Bridget, after taking me to the ER again.
Some of my earliest memories center on my tendency to drop things, break things, and trip. It took me years to understand my spatial relationship with the world. I have never been able to navigate easily. I fall off my bike, I trip up stairs, I go from running to flat on my face.
This has been diagnosed by medical professionals with a variety of explanations, mostly centering on anatomical structures that cause me to have…
Who you once knew, you can now know forever
I quit Facebook a few months ago.
I still have other social media so quitting wasn’t really all that bold a move, but it is when you think about how it has potentially socially stranded me from people in a way that I’ve never before experienced, especially during the disconnection of a pandemic.
But the people I won’t “see” now, are likely people who I was very unlikely to see anyway, Covid or not. The widespread use of Facebook keeps people in my mental periphery who I would otherwise likely forget, as they would likely have forgotten me. And I don’t mean forget, forget, like I wouldn’t…
Along with son Rick, Team Hoyt completed 32 Boston Marathons
Imagine completing 32 Boston Marathons. Now imagine pushing a wheelchair while doing so.
By doing just that, Dick Hoyt became synonymous with the marathon, along with his racing partner son, Rick Hoyt. They almost made it look easy, smiling as they crossed the finish line, year after year.
Dick Hoyt died in his sleep last night in his Holland, MA home at 80. His passing has dominated the Boston news cycle all day, as it should. Politicians, runners, professional athletes and local reporters have all shared stories of meeting the Hoyts on the news and in social media posts. …
St. Patrick’s Day
May the road rise, may the sun shine, and may you laugh at all your grievances
May the road rise just enough to keep people from speeding up it because it wasn’t a cut through street when you moved here, and people are in a real rush nowadays.
May you have held onto your floral/plaid/check prints so when fashion winds blow them back, you don’t have to re-buy something you had 15 years ago.
May they still fit.
May you remember to wear SPF any time the sun shines on your face.
May you have your umbrella handy when the rain does not fall softly, but in sideways sheets driven by unrelenting wind that is only…
Family
I really don’t want to know
There is a chance that I may forget who I am someday. I should be concerned, due to my family being so heavy on the dementia. But when I start to assess my likelihood, I stop. I really don’t want to know. I can’t allow myself to process it emotionally. Maybe it is already creeping in my cerebral crevices.
I guess if I was able to assess my dementia danger, I’d be unable to function. My mother, my aunt, and my grandfather all suffered, and died, from it. And trust, the verb, in this case, is suffer, and it is…
Pandemic Reflections
How I avoided a Covid mask conflict early in the pandemic
Donuts rank high amongst my favorite foods. They remind me of childhood, my mother and beach vacations. They conjure the best gastric-based nostalgia. They are more feeling than food for me. I avoided eating them for years because I knew they held no nutritional value and were just sugar circles, but I am older now, and have learned to care about that less, so very occasionally, I eat donuts. But I only opt for the best. I would never pop one from that ubiquitous New England donut chain in my face. …
St. Patrick’s Day
She could’ve run her 1970s world
Do you hanker for beans, hot dogs and canned brown bread on a Saturday night? Do you start running if you hear, “Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” muttered through gritted teeth? Did you ever get tiny white pleather bag with a rosary and a pocket bible as a gift? If you answer yes to any of these questions, you likely grew up in a very specific type of family, headed by a very specific kind of mother: the Irish-American Mother (I-AM).
A creation of the Irish diaspora, the I-AM, was typically the grandchild of immigrants…
It just keeps growing
My aunt lived in her own museum. She framed every bit of her life for display. Her 1939 first grade penmanship award, her 1937 vaccination record, a tiny clipping of her doppelganger in Life Magazine that someone sent her in 1960, were all framed and hung.
I am now the keeper of this varied documentation. Some of it is as interesting as a letter to her parents from her Air Force commander, thanking them for allowing her to enlist. I laugh at this, because my aunt never sought permission from anyone, and I imagine her reaction to it. I have…
Stacey Curran
Teacher, runner, former journalist; few N.E. Press Assoc. Awards, few Boston Globe essays, few Medium sites, few anthologies, few poems, so many grocery lists.
