Second Wind Publishing discussion

Baseball Hall of Fame announcer Ernie Harwell is the only announcer ever traded for a ballplayer—in 1948, Brooklyn broadcaster Red Barber took ill and general manager Branch Rickey sent minor league catcher Cliff Dapper to the Atlanta Crackers for Harwell. Ernie called Bobby Thompson’s “shot heard around the world” that gave the New York Giants the pennant in a ninth inning playoff game with the Brooklyn Dodgers; sadly, there is no tape of that broadcast. One of my earliest memories is listening to Ernie call Tigers games—“Strike three called, he stood there like the house by the side of the road.” He taught me my love for the game.

Ernie died the other day, from pancreatic cancer, at the age of 92, and I feel another piece of my youth is gone. Ernie faced death the way he faced life: he embraced it, secure with his place in eternity. Still, he’ll be missed by those of us who loved him and listened to him.

Has the death of someone you admired from afar affected you in some profound way? Has it found its way into your fiction?

I had a death affect me profoundly, but it wasn't someone from afar or a "celebrity". It was the death of my wonderful mom last year that ripped my world apart. She was three weeks short of her 96th birthday and I know she lived a good long life, but the last year of her life she went through some horrible emotional pain which impacted the both of us. After her death I started to write her story, in fiction format, but found I was much to angry and grief stricken to write, so I had to put her story away until my own emotions die down and I can give her death some justice.

My sister, Parvaneh Emam was studying "telecommunications" at the University when she was arrested by the Iranian theocracy at the age of 21. A year later she was executed for being a "warrior against God".
Her death inspired me to publish The Little Black Fish, written by an educator and a freedom-fighter who believed in raising awareness in children and younger adults (& literally all ages) to help them better understand the realities of their world and to fight against poverty, lack of freedom and injustice in an effort to make the world a better place for all.
Hopefully I will be able to publish more of Samad Beh-Rang's great books.

Things like this always seem so far away when you read them in the news. Like they could never happen to us. Well us is them and reading something like the post from Ruby brings it home.

I have to admire writers that can write about heart wrenching personal tragedy. I tried a couple of time but ended up crying myself to sleep. I do okay during the day, its that time between bed and sleep I don't do well with. Well maybe not so much during the day either.

My heart goes out to you Ruby and to all the others.

Lavada

Lavada: To write about one’s loss requires the passage of time. At least I found that to be true when I decided to write about my mother’s battle with Parkinson’s disease. Two years after her passing I wrote a piece about watching her succumb, day by day, to its cruelty. By then it was therapeutic, and I found enough time had passed to allow myself to distance myself from the event of her death so that I could provide the piece the subjectivity required to enable an audience to relate to it in their own way and not mine.

Thank you for adding your voice to this string.

The murder of president John F. Kennedy changed the course of history in more ways than we realized at the time. It took our country from the innocent belief that democracy was possible in a country as large and varied as ours. The flood of publications on the who, how & why of the murder have decreased over the years, as the generations age and die. We can look back now & see what the murder of Lincoln did to the plans for granting the privilege of full citizenship to the freed slaves. We can now look back to Nov, 22, 1963 as another of history's sudden turning points.
AS for affecting my writing, it has made me cynical, untrusting of government & somewhat bitter. Perhaps that is part of coming of age.

J,
Thanks for your comment. Maybe after a little more time I will be able to write my mother's story and all the cruelty she suffered.

I suspect the death that most affected my writing was that of my brother's friend from cancer when I was a young teen.

Lavada,
I am deeply moved by your heart-warming message. Yes, it could happen anywhere to anyone as the struggle is universal. My book is not about my sister, it goes far beyond personal experiences and shows a path as how to achieve higher goals.
The much quoted core message of The Little Black Fish is: "...HOW WILL MY LIFE OR DEATH IMPACT THE LIVES OF OTHERS..."
I hope you will find the courage to write about your personal tragedy and I am sure it will help you better cope with it.

Maya Angelou wrote: "People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But they'll never forget how you made them feel."

She gets it, really gets it. I've hurt some people on my journey and I've been hurt a few times, too. While it's no picnic to be on either end, I'd rather be hurt than be the one doing the hurting. However, it's just too bad more people don't live their lives more mindful of Angelou's adage.

My father's bizarre death is what sparked the Winnebago County Mystery Thriller series. I would never want his manner of death to take away from all he did in his life, however!