In Memoriam - Officer Pawlowski, Philadelphia PD (Murdered February 13, 2009)



Yesterday, I wept.
I wept for Officer Pawlowski , another brother in blue, slaughtered senselessly by someone with no regard for human life.

And I wept for his wife, who will never again have the pleasure of feeling her husband’s arms around her or hearing a whispered, “I love you”.

And I wept for their unborn child, who will come into this world without a father and learn early on that it’s, at times, a cruel and hideous place.

And I wept for the officer’s in the City of Philadelphia; who go to work every day underpaid, understaffed, undertrained and underequipped and try to put a tourniquet on a city that’s bleeding out.

And I wept for the City of Philadelphia which can never be “the next great city” until this violence and disregard for life is ended.

And I wept for the citizens of the City of Philadelphia who seem to take the news of another officer’s death so much in stride that they’re not “up-in-arms’ and demanding that something be done.

And when there were no more tears to weep, I prayed. For all the same people that I had been weeping. May God look after them in their sorrow and assist the officer’s and leader’s of this city in their mission.

On Names...
Cindy Newman Campling Newman Frenier Newman Frenier Newman Wakeley – my brother-in-law actually begins his weekly telephone calls to me with this greeting. Really, every blessed time. Each one of my divorces and marriages just succeeds in lengthening the time from his “hello” to actually getting a conversation started. He has advised in the past that perhaps I should keep my maiden name and forget taking my husbands, reminding me that the ink is barely dry on my new driver’s license and social security cards when I’m already requesting to have them changed back again! He’s never suggested that I stop marrying, which would get me off this name-change seesaw – I suppose because he’s been married to my sister for 33 years and wants the same type of life for me. I’m thinking that the next time around, although I’m hoping that with age I’ve become wiser and there won’t be a next time…this time…I may just take his last name, Portnoy, and really give him something to dwell upon each week when he calls.
Now, please don’t think that I’m particularly proud or boastful of my four marriages, or is it three? I married the same man twice so I count that as one marriage. Two horrifically bad experiences wrapped up in the same name and drama. Nor, do I take the institution of marriage lightly. I love the idea of being married. It’s just that I’m a fly- by-the-seat-of-my-pants kind of girl. Today I believe they call it hyperactivity disorder, and while that lifestyle can lead to a life full of fun and adventure, it also opens you up to making some hideously poor and ill thought-out decisions.
I met my first husband hitchhiking down the Shore when I was seventeen…he was driving a fast car, was in the Air Force (oh, how I love a man in uniform) and was willing to share his weed with me. What better reason is there to get married! I was now Cindy Campling and the only good thing that came of those nine years was my son Aric (yes, ARIC, and don’t ask me because I don’t remember). He, A-R-I-C, still teases me that if I’d spelled his name in the common fashion he’d have had more dates in college because the girls thought Aric was a geeky name. But, since every time I visited him there was another cute coed camped in his dorm room, I hardly think his name held him back.
Husband two – also became husband three- hey, he was cuter than Gig Young and had the charisma of Jim Jones. I was now Cindy Frenier. We traveled the world, had lots of adventures and I followed him anywhere, including to the altar twice! Unfortunately, so did all his other women…although not to the altar, just to his hotel room. If he was the chief lemming we’d have all gladly jumped off the cliffs with him and fallen to our deaths. Or, would he have stayed up top and pushed us? I couldn’t wait to get out from under his name, literally. In a moment of hyperactive madness I had paid $100.00 to have his name tattooed on my ass. A quite appropriate place. It then cost me $400.00 and a lot of tears to have it lasered off! My only satisfaction from those seven years is that my name, Cindy Ellen, is STILL tattooed on his left bicep, he being too much of a wimp to withstand multiple sessions under the laser. His fourth wife must be a very understanding woman.
Now, I’m still Cindy Newman, although married (for the 3rd or 4th time depending on how I’m counting) and should be calling myself Wakeley. I’ve chosen this time not to use my husband’s last name, which is too bad for him because if any of them deserved for me to take their name, it’s he. No new driver’s licenses, no new social security cards with ink that takes too long to dry. After thirty years and three, maybe four marriages, I’ve finally listened to my brother-in-law and taken his advice on this issue. I know he’s relieved that I finally listened…when he called me last week he just said, “Hi Cin”.

On Aric

My son, Aric, who I have always called, "Ace", had the lower half of his face cut off yesterday. The doctors immediately reattached it in what the they say will be a better position for his jaws and teeth, but right now I can't believe he was brave enough to proceed with this surgery or that he allowed his wife to e-mail me this photo (at my asking-I just had to see him to know he was okay) knowing I just might show it to others, or heaven forbid, PUBLISH IT! (I suppose all the Dilaudid is clouding his usually very sound mind) They removed the front half of his lower jaw and shortened it, realigning his jaw. They cut his upper jaw in two, front from rear, and lengthened it. His whole mouth is now being held together with titanium pins, rubber bands and steel. Yikes! My head aches in sympathy throbs for him. (Bring me some Extra-Strength Advil) And to think this is all after TWO rounds, and over $10,000 worth of braces. I think he's spent most of his childhood and adult life with his teeth wrapped in plastic and steel!

Now, (look, a new paragraph!) for the really tragic part of the story...NO SOLID FOOD FOR 6 WEEKS!! Okay folks, whom of us would be able to accept that challenge? And during the holidays! ***Note to my overweight readers: This procedure IS NOT a substitute for a healthy diet. So, I'll be spending my day today texting my boy and gleaning every recipe I can find on the Net for "Pureed Christmas Ham", "Turkey Shakes" and "Frappe of Green Bean Casserole ". Nothing's too much for my hero, Ace. Here's to you kid...

On Paragraphs

This morning, very early this morning, when only the newspaper delivery men and women-of-a-certain- age are awake, I decided to use my time constructively and build my first Blog. I’ve been thinking of writing a Blog for years, but always seemed to get distracted by something, or anything, that crossed my mind, path or vision. This morning, focus intact, my Blog got launched. My friend Victoria after reading my Blog gave me a tip about how to make my writings easier for others to read. “Use paragraphs”, she said. “Perhaps even leave a space between paragraphs” was her advice. Victoria, being a “newish” friend recently introduced to me by my friend Karen hasn’t spent enough time with me yet to realize that I don’t think in paragraphs.
¶ A “paragraph” as defined by my good pal Noah is: “A distinct division of a written work that expresses a thought or point relevant to the whole, but is complete in itself”. The idea or concept of a “distinct division of a thought” is totally foreign to me. My brain just isn’t wired that way. Everything I think is a conglomeration of the whole and it’s rare that I divide my thoughts into anything distinct, but simply skip merrily from one to the other letting them flow and dance with each other through my head. Rarely is anything in my head “complete in itself” and I can’t remember a time when I had a “division of thought”. (When I was still on-the-job and found myself in peril of getting my ass kicked or killed I was very good at dividing my thought. Something about a guy waving a knife in your face will help you to find that “distinct division”)
¶If I don’t think in paragraphs it’s impossible for me to write in paragraphs. Most of my friends and family have just gotten used to this quirkiness and have learned to keep up as I interject totally unrelated tidbits and snippets into our conversations easily coming back to the main topic after I digress. Okay, sometimes I forget the original topic and have to ask for directions on how to get back, but for the most part I can usually find my way home. Unless of course, I’m already bored with the original topic of conversation and ready to move on to something new. Which happens frequently…did I mention that I have AD/HD? A mind with AD/HD is just wired differently. I’ve accepted it, learned to work with it and, quite frankly, I like thinking in hyper-drive. Ah, but I digress from my musing on paragraphs. See, I warned you.
¶This Blog will probably be my only serious attempt at paragraphs and I’ve inserted some symbols here for dramatic effect. Sorry Victoria, you’re probably right that it’s easier to read through something that’s divided and separated into separate thoughts and ideas, but all this thinking about paragraphs is so distracting and demanding that I lose all the pleasure of having fifty thoughts coursing through my head and then constructing them into something cohesive and entertaining.
¶So for those of you who choose to enjoy reading my Blogs (and I hope this includes you Victoria), no matter how rambling they may at times seem, thank you. Thank you for allowing me the pleasure of sharing, minus the restrictions of structure and punctuation.

On Life After Florida

You know, I’m entering into my third year of life back in the great, well sometimes not-so-great, northeast and I am coming to accept the fact that God really does have great and omnipotent power. But does he have to show it off all winter? Why on earth, or in heaven, or wherever he (and I say he because if God was a woman she’d know that no sun means we all attain a ghostly winter pallor akin to the color of congealed oatmeal) chooses to reside (probably South Beach this time of year) does he feel the need to turn off the sun for four months every year? Really, I don’t mind the cold. The nipple numbing, lip chapping, fingertips and toes have frostbite cold. I’ve found that tears really can freeze…in your eyes! What I do mind, and what I miss the most about life in the tropics is the SUN!! I’m not sure how he does it or where the sun spends its winters, but I really do miss seeing her shining face every day. I wake every morning, pull back my heavy red velvet winter drapes that keep out the drafts in my 120 year old un-insulated house(yes, we do have two sets of drapes up here- summer and winter) and peek outside for the slightest glimpse of my sister Sun. Seeing her means I get to pull open all the drapes to let her shine in and add her warmth (gotta love that passive solar) and bright light into my Seasonally Affected Disorder home. Yes Virginia, there really is a condition known as “Seasonal Affective Disorder” of which all the sensitive, and sun starved, girls up here are afflicted. In early December, when we still have some sun a good portion of days, we all begin to feel it coming. A little restlessness creeps in with crankiness following shortly behind. Our husbands and significant others, who don’t seem to be so afflicted, are clueless about our mood changes and blame it all on pre-menopause, menopause or post-menopause depending on how far each of us is beyond the great age of fifty. Trying to explain the real reasons for our unsettled emotions would require them to actually have emotions, so we don’t bother trying not really wanting them to emerge from their testosterone fueled emotional abyss. So we all call each other to complain about the dreary days and find ways to pick up each other’s spirits. We remind each other that “this too shall end” - usually sometime around the end of March. We spend days searching all the off-price designer shops seeking the perfect orange or red cashmere sweater to pick up our spirits and, just possibly, stave off those numb nipples. We buy wonderfully colorful, ridiculous hats that we enjoy wearing to make each other laugh and our husbands cringe. “Are you really going to wear a fuchsia bomber hat to the theatre, dear”? (Okay, I'm the hat maven) Most of all we stay in touch. Closely in touch. As in really early morning phone calls while one is commuting to her job in the burbs and the other is busy crocheting an afghan for a third who has been complaining also about her drafty, cold house. (I confess, I’m the crocheter and not a very accomplished one at that-this afghan may never get finished!) We meet for early movies after work and dinners of sushi and sake. If we’re really feeling down we head to our favorite BYOB where the chef fixes us a massive plate of pasta which we wash down with a bottle of Montepulciano. We wander home (yes, all of this is done sans motor vehicles, us city chicks being the epitome of fuel conservation) wrap ourselves up in layers of fleece and hunker down with a good book for yet another wonderful winter in the city, of which we all bitch, but wouldn’t trade for anything.