I had a very strange experience yesterday:
I went to school (elementary through high school) with a fellow named Tim Hansel. We didn't run in the same circles, so were never really friends, just friendly acquaintances. He was a very nice guy, football hero, president of the student body and all that. [I played the lead in the Senior Play.]
After graduation, we went to separate colleges and he, I believe, got involved in wilderness groups, mountain climbing and other stuff that was not part of my world.
The last time I saw him was 15-16 years ago at our 35th high school reunion. He was on crutches, having fallen during a climb, but that night he danced up a storm with his wife.
Later, I understand, Tim wrote several inspirational books.
About a month ago (December 13th), for some reason, I started thinking about Tim. I decided to try to re-connect with him, just to say "hello". I Goggled him, but could find no direct contact, so I e-mailed a couple of people who knew him to ask them for his contact information.
Yesterday, I was informed that Tim had passed away...on December 13th.
Eerie, huh?
I had a copyist friend, Joe Cantlin, who became serioulsy ill with AIDS around 1987, He lived on 79th Street so I would go over to check on him during the summer and fall after he was dismissed from hospital. His health started failing and in November he went back to Beth Israel Hospital, and every night I would go to down to the East Village to see him after work. He stopped eating and showed all signs of his body preparing for death.
On a Sunday in early December, because so many of the orderlies were terrified of contacting the disease, I found him alone in his room, semi-conscious on urine-soaked sheets, a tray of uneaten dinner on his chest, and several piles of dirty sheets in the room. I threw a major fit and got the room cleaned, the sheets removed, and the bed changed. The next night, Monday, when I went to visit him, one of his friends from the NYPL was there, and she and I looted a closet for a basin and towels, stripped Joe and bathed him, and changed his sheets. He was pretty comatose by then, and my last words to him were, I can't be here tomorrow or the next day because I have to finish work for the Men's Chorus concert; I'll see you on Thursday.
I have no idea if he heard me. I was up all night Tuesday night copying band parts for Wednesday's rehearsal. Around 4:30 am, all hell broke loose in my apartment. In my peripheral vision, it looked as though my window blinds were billowing into the room and there was a lot of sparkly lights. Around noon, Wednesday, I was called at the Drama Book Shop by another friend of Joe's and told that Joe died at 4:30 am.
