In the Fall of 1999, as a newly minted father of a baby girl and the step-father of a tween, my wife and I purchased our first house in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles. The first to welcome us to our new home lived one house over.
Richard, or Rick as he was known to friends and family, was a vibrant man in his mid 40s. His Caribbean roots shown through in his style and the general cadence of his life. He had been introduced to fatherhood just a year earlier. His beautiful daughter would look up at him with her long brown hair and wide open eyes.
You welcomed us to this valley home.
A daughter clinging to your shoulders
Like Rose, Rachel still wore diapers.
For six years we shared a common wall;
five feet high and made of cinder block.
Hand shakes and calls of, "hey neighbor."
Summers, I heard you playing with your girls.
Laughter, teases, the sound of splashing in your pool.
Rick and I immediately hit it off and I looked forward to chats with him over the common wall between our homes. Fall turned to winter, winter to spring, Spring to summer. BBQs, poolside, the occasional beer, griping, compliments, flirting with each other’s wives.
Watering the lawn, the patchwork of greens;
Our girls played under the arc of water.
Serena and Rachel,
Jade and Rose,
Jasmine watching from the side.
Francesca gossiping,
or was that talking,
with Natalie.
Each year, we stayed the same
and our children grew.
From babies to toddlers, walking.
Walking to running.
I taught Rose to ride on two wheels.
Just like Rachel, she said.
I remember how impressed I was by Rick's work as a TV graphic animator. I wasn’t the only one. He had won an Emmy for his work.
My wife gave birth to a baby girl in 2001. Not long after, Rick and his wife had their second baby girl. Two dads surrounded by girls.
To your girls I was "the other daddy."
What an honor
to share the title daddy.
We were two men among too many girls.
Jade's start on life was not easy. Her first 6 months were spent going back and forth to doctor offices and hospitals to correct a congenital heart defect. I remember talking to Rick about the $75,000 bill I received from Blue Cross for Jade’s open heart surgery. My favorite part of the bill was, "You are responsible for: $300."
As every story has a bit of foreshadowing, we joked, in an almost uncomfortable way, that it was good I had insurance otherwise he'd be looking at new neighbors.
Around 2004, Rick lost his job and the security that came with it. Technology, it seems, doesn’t take kindly to digital artists who don't keep up with the latest tools. Proud and determined, in his late 40s, Rick went back to school to learn the latest tools of the trade all the while continuing the search for freelance work.
At some point, Rick's health insurance ran out and the cost of a personal policy was too much. Their rainy day fund was being challenged by the length of the storm they were facing.
Rick and I would talk frequently about the frustrations of looking for work, his studies and the new technology he was learning. He continued to stay optimistic, eyes on the future.
Then, in early 2006, the fruits of his labor began to pay off. Gigs started lining up for him and he was once again in demand.
Of course, this isn't a story with a happy ending.
Shortly after starting his new job, Rick was struck by horrific back pains. The pain wasn't new. He had felt it months earlier but avoided doctor visits because of the lack of insurance. This time was far worse.
He soldiered on determined to work through it. His job required long hours at a computer making colors fly and digital objects come to life. The pain to sit was unbearable but he was thankful to have a new freelance job. That point is important. Rick was still freelance – self-employed and without easy access to affordable health insurance.
Still working to climb out of the financial hole that two years of unemployment caused, Rick shunned doctor visits – opting instead to pay the mortgage, keep the lights on and buy groceries.
When the pain was too much, he relented and had his first doctor visit since his insurance ran out. He was told his back was being destroyed from the inside out by an aggressive cancer and his spine had turned as brittle as that of an 80-year-old woman with osteoporosis. The pain, he told me, was from the cancer pushing against the wall of his spine – breaking it apart and leaving jagged pieces to pierce the surrounding tissue.
After a surgery that, in Rick's words, fought the cancer but killed the patient, my wife and I visited him in the nursing home where he had been moved. He was happy to see us but was clearly embarrassed that we were seeing him in a facility where most people go to die.
He lay in a bed with a thin blue cover, his back numb from pain killers. Cards and drawings from his daughters were on the wall, a TV was on and he had a well worn bible by his side. He was too weak to lift up the book and depended on his family to read to him.
Despite the diagnosis and prognosis, Rick was optimistic and his optimism was contagious. We talked about taking our daughters camping when he was out. We talked about the work he loved so much. He asked about us. My wife and I managed to get a few laughs out of him. A few because, despite the drugs, it really did hurt when he laughed.
Your smiles and friendly jokes about wives will be missed
The feigned look of fear we shared for the women
we are lucky to have.
My last visit with Rick was back at his house. He decided he wanted to die at home. I sat quietly with him for about an hour in his room holding his hand. I told him he was loved and was looking forward to his next BBQ. Rick didn't answer me. He was in an induced coma – the pain had been too much.
I fumbled at Rick's bible, trying to find an appropriate passage to read to him – not easy when the book is so unfamiliar to an agnostic. Rick had turned to the bible on a regular basis in his final month. I wrote to my step-mother that night asking for her advice on which passage I could read the next time I was with him.
She wrote back, "The 23rd, Psalm, 'The Lord is my Shepherd' is meaningful to most religious people. The 24th psalm is also very beautiful, as is the 40th Psalm."
He was gone before I could read to him again. I wish I had been able to read this passage from the 24th.
He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart;
who hath not lifted up his soul into vanity,
nor sworn deceitfully.
He shall receive the blessing from the LORD,
and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
If anyone deserved such a blessing, it was Rick.
At his funeral that week, I watched as his daughter, just 7 at the time, stood and eulogized her father – strong and proud. My turn was not as easy. While Rachel was comforted by her belief that her father would now "be living in the largest, most beautiful house in heaven," I knew how alone I would be in my back yard without my favorite neighbor on the other side of our common wall.
From school, I remember
parallel lines are supposed to go on forever;
never touching, always close by.
But standing on steel tracks
even paired lines find
a point far in the distance where they meet.
How lonely to continue without you.
No more kindred spirit.
No more other, other daddy.
No more fatherly voices from the other side of the wall.
No more lessons in fatherhood.
We shared a common wall;
five feet high and made of cinder block.
A wall but not a barrier.
Rick's story is not isolated. Every day, people are faced with the decision to pay the doctor or pay the mortgage. Every day, people end up on the wrong side of a diagnosis that came too late.
Even now, I struggle with my own decisions when it comes to a health insurance policy that includes many thousands in deductibles: Every doctor visit costing as much as a week's worth of groceries. Each x-ray costing as much as a major tune up for the family car.
Health reform became personal for me the day Rick died. I watched my friend's widow and his young daughter release a dove at his funeral. We all watched and cried as it flew away – imagining it was taking Rick's spirit back to the island where he was born.
The songs they played at his funeral will forever be associated with that day. One started to play as I read the latest news about our current health care debate.
One column away was a headline about the sobering anniversary of 9/11.
Attacked, we rallied, determined to show the world our strength of will and our unbreakable morale. I remember standing outside my home with Rick and my neighbors during the first candlelight vigil. We held candles and American flags. We were angry and filled with sorrow but proud. We shared a love of country and respect for each other. We all carried the same flag – a symbol of our shared values.
Helped by two popular songs that always end up being played somewhere, I am constantly reminded of my friend and his last days. I often wonder if he would be here today had he not lost his job – had he not lost his security. I wonder if an early visit with a doctor would have uncovered a small but treatable tumor before it spread and destroyed his back and took his life.
I wish I didn't have to wonder. I wish that we didn't need to have a debate about providing health care to all Americans. I wish that our love of country and love of neighbor meant that health care was a universal right and not a budget battle.
I wish Rick was still my neighbor.
This is why health reform is personal. This is why we must all fight for it.