On The Funway

I hope this news doesn't catch anyone reading this by surprise. On Monday of this week, baldanders, aka Scraps, had a hemorrhagic stroke. He's still in the ICU at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn. Details and updates are being posted at Making Light.

mjlayman is organizing a fundraising drive with help from daystreet-- Scraps doesn't have health insurance, and, being a freelance copyeditor, he doesn't have sick leave or any other employer-provided disability plan, either.

Of necessity, my own contribution was tiny, but even tiny donations help.

In an odd way, I helped Scraps move twenty years ago this month, though I don't think I met him until sometime in this millennium.

I was staying at Gary Farber's apartment in Washington Heights during a visit to New York in October, 1988. Scraps had moved out shortly before and was having many boxes of books shipped to him. The UPS driver wouldn't come up any stairs, so Gary and I moved the boxes down to the ground floor.

That was the first I'd heard of moving by UPS. At the time, it seemed truly odd. Curiously enough, in 2004, FedEx Ground turned out to be 30 cents a pound cheaper than my professional movers. (The pro price includes 5 months of storage, but FedEx was still lower even without that.)

I met galacticvoyeur during that 1988 visit to New York. That led to good things. Much though I set out to, I didn't ride the Staten Island Ferry that trip, nor during any of the many times I came to New York in the years that followed, right up until this September, including even a visit to Staten Island when pnh and tnh were living there. Many fans have heard me tell the tale of my efforts to ride the ferry, how Farber and I ended up on the observation deck of the World Trade Center instead, and the surprises that did and didn't occur there.

And, yes, just last month I finally rode the ferry. I visited Coney Island for the first time, too, just for good measure. 'Twas a beautiful day.

Even after all these years, I know roadnotes much better than I know baldanders, and even that's not nearly as well as I'd like to know both of them. I hold them and all of their loved ones in my heart this week, gently, gently as I follow the online updates, listen to music, and find hope in the experiences of others who have recovered from horrific strokes of their own.

Here's wishing all of us many beautiful days ahead.