by Fred Galvin
Stoopball is played by throwing a Spaldeen against a stoop. The game is known as “Up-Against” in Boston (that figures), “Pinners” in Chicago (why?), and “Off the Point” elsewhere (you’ll understand this name in a minute). A distant cousin is “curb ball,” which is played in the suburbs where there aren’t as many stoops as there are in the city. With curb ball, the ball is bounced off the cement curb on the street.
The “batter” is the kid throwing the ball against the stoop and the other kid, or kids, are fielders. The idea is for the batter to throw the ball against the stoop in such a way that it flies as far as possible toward, and hopefully beyond the fielders thus scoring runs determined by how far and in what direction the ball flies. An out occurs if the ball is caught on the fly or on the ground before passing any fielder. An inning consists of three outs and each kid is his own team. A game is nine innings or however many as agreed by all participants. The skill comes in by trying to throw the ball hard directly against the ninety-degree angle formed by a step (thus the name “Off the Point”) which, if done to perfection, will send the ball high and far over all the fielders, resulting in a home run. By altering the angle at which the Spaldeen is thrown, imparting various spins and hitting the point of a step perfectly, a batter can amass numerous runs and attain city-block bragging rights.
Anyway, as I said, Ken Garner was the best stoopball player I ever knew and I dare say was nearly as good as I was. He’d win three of every five games we’d play and if we teamed up there was no other duo in all of Brooklyn capable of beating us.
Alas, there is no future in stoopball, since there are no professional stoopball teams or leagues. So Ken and I went in different career directions. I went to the police academy for six months and became a cop solving murders. Ken’s professional road was much more difficult than mine. He had four years of medical school beyond his bachelor’s followed by a four-year residency to become a gynecologist.
He opened a practice barely four blocks from the apartment Jen and I shared, so we managed to keep in contact. We made it a habit to meet for lunch or drinks no less frequently than monthly just to keep in touch. He enjoyed my cop stories and he asked me plenty of questions. Occasionally he’d ask to join Ronnie and me on a run or a stakeout that had little risk. When we would take him out, he was like a kid in a candy store. He’d prop himself up and use an official cop voice. “If you make a collar can I read the perp his rights? Can I Mirandize him?” Ken then proceeded to recite the Miranda rights script perfectly without a cue card.
Ronnie got a kick out of that and said, “Sure you can. You can even slap the cuffs on him while doing it! If you want, we can stop at a Walgreens and get you a replica detective’s shield.” I would not have been surprised if Ken had said he already had one.
Given what he dealt with on a daily basis, I really had only one question for Ken and I’m sure you can guess what it was, especially if you’re a male of the species. My immature image of an OB/GYN’s day involved sexy women disrobing so he could examine their private parts. Of course, the reality was far different. Not every woman is classically sexy, yet they all have private parts that required examination.
I remember once, after a couple of beers, asking him with an evil smirk what it was like in his profession, implying the obvious. His response was classic and removed my smirk. “DD, don’t kid yourself. First of all, I always have a nurse present during examinations.”
“Wise move.”
He paused and perused the lounge. I followed his gaze down the bar toward a booth which was occupied by two women. One was well dressed and attractive. The other had a whiny child in tow and obviously had had a rough few days. Her hair looked like a cat got stuck in it, and frankly, she looked like she could use a bath. He sighed, took a long pull on his beer, belched, looked back at me, and nodded toward the booth. “Some days are better than others, if you catch my drift.” I looked again toward the booth and indeed caught his drift.
As I said, Ken’s office was a mere four blocks from our apartment and since I knew and trusted him it was a no-brainer for us to choose him as Jen’s OB/GYN. I had no hang-ups about my good friend examining my wife. He was a professional and never ever made light of it. For her part, Jen may have had some initial reservations given Ken was a childhood friend of mine, but they quickly disappeared with her first consultation with him. I did not tag along because I wanted her to make her own decision. I had told her I was good however she decided.
When I came home that evening she was standing in the kitchen with one hand on her hip, a wooden spoon held in the other, and a scowl on her beautiful face. I thought I was going to get one across the chops for suggesting she allow my friend to peer where only I was allowed to peer. But then she burst out laughing, never able to keep a straight face for long.
“Shit! Here I was going to get on your case about sharing me with your buddy and humiliating me. But I just can’t help laughing. Dan, Ken was totally professional and he put me at ease immediately. His nurse Lauren was present and we discussed how he would conduct his examinations. The kicker was his manner. He was very caring and low-key. He said he gives each of his patients individual and thorough attention but that I would get a little extra care given I’m your wife. He also said something a little odd. He mentioned he felt kind of guilty for having beaten you in stoopball so many times as kids and wanted to make it up to you. When I asked him what the hell stoopball was he laughed and told me to ask you.” Hands on hips. “So spill. Stoopball?”
I started laughing. “That’s hilarious. Stoopball was a game we played in Brooklyn as kids.” Then, as men do, I warmed up to the explanation. “You took a Spaldeen ball and threw it against the steps of a stoop and—”
Jen’s eyes began to roll up into her forehead and she held up her hand. “Never mind. I really don’t want to know. If he’s going to give me extra care out of guilt for having beaten you in a silly game as kids, then that’s fine with me.”
“Silly game? Now Jen, stoopball was far from silly. It was—”
She put two fingers on my lips and kissed me to shut me up. “Never mind, my love. I love you no matter how you played stoopball. I felt safe in Ken’s hands.” She poked my stomach and grinned, “if you know what I mean.”
Chapter 5: My cell vibrated
Jen had a warped sense of humor when it came to the two dreaded annual female health appointments. She would say that it was either time to get her “boob-squish,” which was her mammogram, or time to get her “pap smeared,” which was self-explanatory. In either case I got the message. Neither was a pleasant experience for her—or for any woman, I suspected.
Her latest appointment with Ken was for the Pap and happened to be scheduled for two weeks after our retirement discussion. When finalizing the decision, we had been caught up in a steamroller of emotions ranging from elation and anticipation to a certain degree of apprehension. The latter was easily subdued and we focused on the excitement of enjoying our free time for decades to come.
We had started making plans to travel. At the top of the list, of course, was taking the ferry out to see Libby up close. After that it was looking like the first trip was going to be a flight to Barcelona, Spain, for a Mediterranean cruise. There would be stops in Monte Carlo, Rome, Naples–Pompeii–Capri, Florence, and Majorca. I knew about Rome, gladiators, lions, and all that stuff, and that Pompeii was buried by a volcanic eruption back when dinosaurs still were around, right? And everyone knew that Monte Carlo was where James Bond went to gamble. (Princess Grace who? What Grand Prix race?) But the rest were going to be totally foreign to me, pun intended.
Jen wasn’t due for a mammo for six more months but it had been about a year since her last Pap smear, even though that’s not quite the way my sweet wife put it. “The boobies are good for a while but I guess I need to get my pap smeared before we hit the road to Europe.” Over the years I had come to understand that it was her way of making light of a serious preventive maintenance exa
mination. It helped reduce the stress of waiting for the all-clear letter. Actually, since she started going to Ken for these appointments he would do her the courtesy of a personal phone call to let her know that everything was fine.
Until it wasn’t.
Three days after Jen’s Pap smear appointment the phone vibrated with Ken’s caller ID. However, this time it wasn’t Jen’s phone that vibrated. It was mine. Usually when I saw that it was Ken calling I assumed he was ready for some “man time” as he put it. Given the nature of his profession, I fully understood that he would sometimes be in need of a testosterone-laden evening of beer, pizza, farting, and belching, all while watching the Yankees hopefully win a game on the big screen at our local watering hole.
I was in the precinct at my desk wrapping up some paperwork. Ronnie was sitting in my guest chair as we were pondering our next move on a case involving the murder of two young women, which was most likely at the hands of their mother. Ronnie was clearly upset by this one and I wanted to wrap it up before my retirement.
“I just don’t get it. What could your children possibly have done to cause you to want to kill them? I mean just because you gave them life doesn’t mean you can take it from them.” Ronnie shook her head in bewilderment. “My CI Louie believes she frequents The Ten Bells. It’s a wine bar on Broome Street.” The acronym CI was cop-speak for confidential informant. More on CIs a little later.
“Yeah, I know the place. It’s next to Franzoni’s Pizza Shop. You can get a huge slice for only two bucks. We can grab a couple of slices then grab the wine-drinking child killer.”
My cell vibrated on my desk. Ronnie and I made it a habit to always keep our cells on vibrate. That way they wouldn’t inadvertently ring at a bad time if we forgot. I picked it up, saw the caller ID, and leaned back in my chair. “Hey Ken, wassup? Tired of looking at lady parts and need some man time?” That drew a quizzical look from Ronnie as she mouthed, “Lady parts?”
I knew immediately by his tone that this was not such a call. He usually addressed me as “DD” as he had since we were kids. But this time it was “Dan.”
“Dan, do you have a few minutes? Are you alone?”
A shiver went through me and my back straightened. Ronnie picked up on my change in demeanor and looked at me with concern. I got up from my desk, pointed at the phone, and mouthed, “I’ve got to take this.” She nodded, gave my arm a squeeze, and went around to her desk which was opposite mine and separated by a low cubicle partition. She looked at me with concern.
“Sure, Ken. Hang on a second while I go to an interview room.” I went across to Interview Room-3, closed the door, and made sure the surveillance camera was off. I started pacing. I never could sit down when on a call that was anything but casual. This one had a distinct noncasual smell to it.
“Okay, Ken. Shoot.”
I heard him sigh. “Dan, I usually ask my patients to come to the office when I have results to discuss but I don’t want to put the stress of dealing with dread and worry on you and Jen while waiting for the meeting. So I decided to call you. I’ll get right to it. I received the results of Jen’s latest test early yesterday morning. I didn’t like what I saw so I returned them for validation. They came back this afternoon and I called Phil Bronson to confirm personally. He’s in charge of the lab that processes our tests.”
He paused.
Years of conducting one-on-one discussions have told me which pauses to fill with questions and which pauses should be left alone. This pause was one of the latter. I discerned Ken was digging deep to tell me what he had to tell me. I heard him take in a long breath and exhale. Time slowed down. I waited.
“When Jen came in for her examination we chatted for a few minutes as usual. I asked her the standard pre-test questions. One of them had to do with abdominal discomfort. She mentioned that she was experiencing uncomfortable sensations the past few months. She stressed that she thought they were not serious enough to worry you about but she had made a point of informing me. I decided that during this session I would do a more in-depth exam and take some tissue for biopsy.”
I knew that when a doctor said the word “biopsy” it could be followed by either very good news or very bad news. This news was not going to be the very good kind.
“The results I had the lab double check indicate there is a tumor on Jen’s cervix. The cervix is located on the lower end of the uterus. Dan, this tumor is aggressive, and I believe it is at an advanced stage. I’m going to order an immediate MRI and conduct more tests to get as much data as possible.”
I had to sit down, or in this case, collapse down on the metal chair reserved for the perps in this interview room. I felt flushed, sweat broke out on my forehead, and my hands were shaking. Questions flooded my mind. How? Why? What’s next? I refused to even acknowledge the obvious question. How long? My professional training and experience over the years had taught me how to remain calm in a crisis, especially when conducting interrogations unless, of course, I was playing bad cop. Then all bets were off. But this … I had no experience to fall back on to handle this.
I struggled unsuccessfully to keep my voice steady. “What … what do you mean by ‘an advanced stage’?”
“There are four stages to this type of tumor. All indications are that this one is at Stage 3, nearly to Stage 4, which means it has spread to the pelvic wall, most likely to the kidneys, and maybe more distantly.”
He may as well have been sitting across from me and just hit me in the gut with a baseball bat. I couldn’t say anything.
“Dan? You still there?”
“Shit, Ken. She has this test every year. How is it that it wasn’t detected earlier? How the hell could it be so advanced so quickly? What do we do now?”
Another deep inhale and exhale. “I know Dan. It seems it should have manifested itself earlier. However, this particular type is very aggressive, as I mentioned. It’s rare. I’ve only seen maybe a dozen cases like this over the past twenty years.”
“Yeah? Really? Only a dozen? And how did those dozen turn out, Ken? Did Mr. Aggressive Cervical Big C win all of those? Is he undefeated?”
There was a pause before Ken answered. “Dan, I called you first instead of Jen because I wanted you to hear it as soon as I did and absorb the news so you could tell Jen in your way. You know best how to tell her. Then I want you both to come in so I can answer every question you have and review all the options available. I’d like you to let me know when you’ve talked with Jen and when you two would like to come in. I will clear my calendar for you any time that works for you, day or night, starting immediately.”
~~~
In just about everyone’s lifetime there comes an event that permanently changes the immediate path their life at least ninety degrees, and sometimes more. The ninety-degree events are usually positive in nature, like suddenly meeting the person who will become a soul mate for life (like what happened to me when I met Jen), marrying that person (ditto), having a child, being born again to a religion, and even getting that job or winning the lottery.
However, most all of the more-than-ninety-degree permanent life-altering events are not positive. They tend to come unexpectedly and suddenly: a car accident resulting in severe injury, dismemberment, or death; a severe financial setback; being victimized by a weather or geological event such as a tornado or earthquake; or even by a crime.
I have seen people’s lives change before my eyes as I have had to inform them of a loved one’s death at the hands of another. It was the most traumatic and heart-wrenching part of the job. Ronnie and I always backed each other up when a family notification was required and we both were equally affected. People would literally deflate and collapse both physically and emotionally. The looks in their eyes were universal. In rapid succession we would see disbelief, panic, denial, surrender, acceptance, and desperation in not knowing where or to whom to turn. Where does my life go now? How do I go on from this? Can I go on from this? Do I want to go on from this?
/> Perhaps the most significant and devastating is a life-threatening illness, especially one that is totally unexpected and rapid in development.
As I just sat in that cold hard chair, my senses numb, trying to process what Ken was saying, I truly did not know what to do or what to say to him. Only a few minutes ago life was good for Jen and me, our outlook rosy and exciting. We were looking forward to a life of relative leisure, a life of being together, a life of love and happiness without the stresses we, and so many others, lived with on a daily basis. Our routines would change to be exactly what we wanted rather than being dictated by the quest for the legal tender.
Now I was floundering, trying to make sense out of what Ken was telling me. My phone was still to my ear, but I heard nothing. My eyes were open, but I saw nothing. My mind both raced and came to a halt at the same time. It was now my turn to wonder where my life would go and just how (and if) it possibly could. And the worst was wondering how to tell Jen.
Then I heard a distant voice saying, “We’ll be there by ten tomorrow morning.” I realized the voice was mine.