Procrastinet

Memorial Messages

filed under: Hey, What's The Big Idea

Today marks a week since the bike accident that killed Elizabeth Padilla on 5th Avenue in Brooklyn. A few people who knew her or her family have written comments to my first post about the accident. They too feel that the New York Daily News' coverage of the accident was slanted against Ms. Padilla.

In the interest of redressing that imbalance, I wanted to reprint here two of those testimonials. I know people are finding these posts through Google, and I'd like as many of them as possible to hear perspectives on Ms. Padilla's life from those who were touched by it.

First, from Beth:

I went to high school with Liz and am attending the funeral services today... Sometimes it's hard to make sense of such a tragedy to such a young life. Liz was truly a remarkable person...one of the nicest and sweetest people I've ever known.

And from BT:

Liz was one of the strongest, smartest, healthiest and most beautiful people that I've ever met. In fact, almost all superlatives describe her. Her life was based entirely on helping people.

The daily news article angered me. If they wanted to write something interesting, instead of the inflammatory article, they could discuss her work with those with HIV/AIDS, the time she spent helping the blind (3 blind people were at her memorial service), her work as a volunteer firefighter in high school, college and law school, her tutoring of high school students, and on and on and on. You get the point. The world lost a great asset on Thursday...

* * *

About ten years ago, a colleague of mine died in a car accident. Those of us who had worked with him had mostly thought of him only carelessly - he was an odd duck, a touch buffoonish, a bit dense sometimes, and could be quite frustrating in day-to-day interactions.

When he died, we were all thunderstruck by how much we missed him, by how suddenly all we could remember about him was his almost supernatural good cheer, which we had taken for granted - his guileless kindness and warmth. I was immediately ashamed of the slight regard in which I'd held him, and it's a shame that sticks with me to this day.

We shouldn't need death to remind us to value life, but somehow we seem to. If you're so inclined, take a moment to appreciate the people in your life, be they saints or clowns. You would miss them if they were gone - try not to miss them while they're here.

Posted by rjt at June 16, 2005 03:46 PM