An Open Letter to My Kessler Family
Long happy to be home with Maggie and my children and while blessed to embrace their love and goodness every day, I am, I believe, as content with my disability as one can be. I am a grateful and lucky man.
But there was a part of my spirit that was left at the Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation where I lived for 7 months in the purposeful company of friends like me who longed to reclaim life.
There, I was blessed to be Phil Rizzuto’s best friend and to share in Kelly Chinchar’s journey and to have been there for Carl Lawson on that horrific first day and to have prayed with Lawrence and to have spiritually enjoined the lives of so many others.
This is to all of them.
*****
As to our time!
It was what it was. It rests in its own time. It is the stuff of yesterday and memory. It is of mist and shadow and sunset.
But I still see you all, I still feel your embrace, your hand, I hear your voices, I still wince at your pain. I'm still angry for you. I’m still mad that fortune or fate demanded so much of you.
I still rejoice in the strides that you made and wonder what greater strides you are making now. I am so glad to have had moments with Kelly and Lawrence and Carl afterwards and I wonder about Dave Capelli and Ray and Jackie and Diane and Donna and Jay and so many others, my friends and yours, who struggled with us to reclaim our lives and our purpose. I wonder how Ray did, escaping the world of bloods and crypts, in Alabama. I wonder how they are all doing and I miss them so.
What we gave each other there, the raw encouragement, the affection, the tears, the laughter, the determination or will, the comfort, the being in it all together, the words --- all of this and more still pulsates inside me. It is in the very air that I breathe and in the blood that runs through my veins. It haunts and drives me constantly, and sometimes almost unforgivingly. And so, as spiritually rich and blessed as I may be, I am lonely for it, for you, and for the raw power of what we so very innocently did for each other. I need a fix, I fear at times, that can only come from tapping the residue of what was nurtured there.
I still miss getting the jolly ranchers handed to me every morning and afternoon, Dave. I miss your blood curdling screams that outdid mine ...... and I miss our long, philosophical conversations, Ron ...... and I miss our 3:00 or 4:00 am "Our Fathers" with Paul, Lawrence …… and I miss the joy and pride I felt as you fought back, Carl ..... and Kelly, I miss, yet see your smile every day. I reach for your innocence and grace ...... and Pat, I so miss your Dad and will always be grateful to him for the rich and cherished friendship we shared. A couple of my sons brought home Dream Team the other night, a movie I loved years ago. I had forgotten Phil's role in it and I had to fight back tears when I heard his wonderful voice.
We redeemed each other, my friends. More than the therapists, it was we, who suffered together, who touched each other's souls. It was we who restored each other's spirits. We enabled each other to believe again, to dream again. I know, deep down, I know, that it was your pain, your suffering, your struggle that redeemed me and enabled me to conquer my own demons and to find the strength to achieve as best I could.
My purpose here, in the midst of one of these reflective sojourns, is to say thanks and to say it as loudly as I can and to let you know that you are loved by this old warhorse and forever in his prayers.
I have lived a full life and been witness to and even done some extraordinary things and I have known and given great love, but there was something about our Kessler days that stands apart from all the rest, from any other movement or time in a life. Only there, were we compelled to reach for the very best that was in us, for every ounce of strength that we had in order to reclaim body and spirit and to reconcile ourselves to a life of challenge and complication.
Seven months of my life were lived there. Capelli left four days before me and so for four days, I reigned as the last man standing (or sitting as the case may be). For four days, I was the patient who had more days in than anyone. And for seven days, I had a single room in the new building, a room with a beautiful poinsettia and all kinds of new toys,
but I missed my roommates, their voices, their noise. I carefully studied those who cared for me -- Rob and James and Leon and LeTonya and Rosa.
I prepared, so very excitedly for Christmas and home. After an amazing 441 days, home! So very lucky, home! Almost impossibly, home! Five days before Christmas, home! But a part of me remained with you. And every now and then, like now, I reach for you and thank God that I had the pleasure of your company.
Yes, a significant piece of my heart and soul was left there, left with you, my beloved Kessler friends. God love you all
