Interlude, True

And speaking of Doug Sonderman, when my father was dying in St. Jude Hospital - so this would have been, let's say, late February into early March, 1987 - Doug's brother Denny was there, too, and in a coma after maybe falling out of a truck or something? I can't remember now exactly the circumstances, but it seems like it wasn't even what they might call a bad fall, but there he was hooked up to machines nonetheless.  Good times all the way around.

Anyway, on a couple of occasions, maybe more, I went to Denny's room and sat with him, and I talked to him because I'd heard that was something to do, the voices could be helpful, maybe keep a person going inside; he might even remember the conversations when he woke up.  I had an all access pass to ICU and could pretty much go where I wanted.  I didn't really know Denny, he was a year or two older and mostly a dick to me as kids, but what the fuck, right? Plus I adored their mother - Lola? - she was always lovely to me. And I liked Doug.

Anyway, my dad didn't come out of St. Jude and, though I was living in Santa Cruz at the time and may not have got the final word on Denny, the sense I got was he wasn't going to come back from that, either.  A Goddamn shame on both counts.


IBL:mm