A Double Tragedy, A Lingering Sadness and Murky But Happy Expectations

I’m writing this on early Sunday afternoon, April 30th.

As always, lots on my mind but three primary things have risen to the surface of my febrile brain.

So, as I’m going to be traveling some this week and some more the following week, I need to go ahead and get this one in the can.

This upcoming weekend brings us the Kentucky Derby. Always a good reminder that there is much chance in our lives. Please Carpe Diem.

A DOUBLE TRAGEDY

Many years ago, a fine young man named Carl Smalls was brutally murdered. A gang-banger, A Blood did it, ambushed him at an out of control Greek party at a shabby nightclub just outside Columbia. Shot him many times in a dingy back hallway where he had been lured for what in essence was his execution. Carl was a good student from as nice a family as you can imagine. He was thoughtful and well-mannered. And he was a growing big fellow, a rising star football player at The University of North Carolina.

His family and friends and community were understandably in agony, shattered, pained to the quick. A huge tragedy. The first tragedy .

His killer was picked up, tried, convicted and sentenced to 35 years in prison.

His killer is named Jeroid Price. He, as I write, is a fugitive. He is on the lam.

How did he get out so early?

He was released 19 years early on what can only be termed a secret, under the table, deal smarmy brokered by a lawyer and a judge, the latter retired the day after he signed the order for the bum’s release. By the way, not only were no interested parties, family, friends, law enforcement given notice as to what was going on, there was never a hearing and the ‘order’ signed by the judge was never filed with the clerk of court.

Intentionally deceitful.

By time the word of what had happened got out and the Supreme Court of South Carolina held an emergency hearing and ordered that Price be detained and returned to prison to complete his sentence, Price had a head start of many weeks. As I write, Price could be anywhere. A complete failure of our justice system.

What do you think of that lawyer? That Judge?

The lawyer is a fellow named Todd Rutherford, a South Carolina legislator. The judge was Casey Manning.

Can you imagine what his family must be going through now?

The second tragedy writ large. Horrible.

(My interest goes beyond a ‘lawyer’s interest’. I along with my dear friend and mentor Kermit King represented the Smalls family in a successful wrongful death suit against the fraternity and sorority that sponsored the party and the owner of the club and the real estate management company that ‘oversaw’ the building the club was in. And now this. I have emotional skin in the game. I am seething.)

So, unhappily, we must watch this space for further developments. And I promise you I will.

As William Faulkner wrote so long ago, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”

A LINGERING SADNESS

A great friend and fraternity brother died about a month ago. I went to New York City for his services. He was a great guy, beloved by so many.

The reception afterwards was fully and fulsomely attended. People came from all over to say goodbye and to pay respects to his widow and adult children.

I brought the service program home with me; it had a great picture of him on its front page.

I needed to send his widow a note. I did so this morning. It all felt so futile and sad. I am rarely at a loss for words but this one was a close run thing…but got it legibly written/typed (over the years my handwriting, never good, has gotten really bad, virtually illegible now) and the note is on its way.

I promised his widow, a good friend too, that I would not be a stranger and I won’t.

And once the note was completed, for just a split second, I thought about discarding the program, tossing it into the paper and more paper flotsam and jetsam trash can that rides beneath me at my work table. No reason to keep it. But I couldn’t do it and won’t.

It will go upstairs to my desk in my bedroom. I will look at it from time to time over the next many years. It’s a talisman of memory, good memories.

When I’m gone, hopefully a long time from now, my children, in the cleaning up and cleaning out of my papers and records will surely toss it with so much other stuff. But they’ll see it and be reminded that he was my great friend and they will know that I was loyal to his memory. In sadness, a good lesson for them.

MURKY BUT HAPPY (I HOPE) EXPECTATIONS

Well, let me finish up here with something I hope will be positive and rewarding.

Next week, I’m going to New York for a couple of days-lots of good food, a Broadway play, some jazz, nice hotel, a few museums and basically lots of ‘I’m A Tourist’ rubbernecking and gawking. Aside from my travels that dealt with my friend’s illness and death-as noted above-I haven’t been in NYC to play in probably six-plus years.

And then, will rent a car and drive north and west of the city and go to Wallingford, Connecticut 06492 for my (Good Lord!!) 55th Class Reunion at my old boarding school, The Choate School.

It’s a gorgeous place. As I have told many, “I was so lucky. I got to go to college for four years and then I got to go to college for another four years!”

I am told that out of an original class of 120 guys, a big number of us are still around and will be in attendance.

Have to wonder what it will be like, what we will look like.

I enjoyed and loved the school. It was my launching pad. My curiosity is palpable.

Many of us have provided up-to-date biographies and histories. Much of it is fascinating and impressive.

And, what the hell, we’re still standing!

So, I will report. Ought to be more than interesting. 

Here endeth the lesson. Remember-Always try to bet on the good ponies.

Stay safe. Keep reading and writing. All my Best,

Vernon