Poorly

My friend John had an aneurysm a week ago.

I've known him about twenty years. We have worked together painting houses, we hang out together socially. We have shared some activist causes. We have many friends in common.

John had a five-hour emergency surgery, and since then he has been slowly recovering. He is in the upper third of victims of aneurysms, because the doctors say he will probably get back to some sort of normal life. But I was disturbed by the visit. His speech is very low, unclear, and mumbling. He knew who I was but his grasp of the situation didn't go much beyond that. He kept drifting in and out of sleep.

John's main activism is making the world friendlier to bicycle riders. Every way in which Philadelphia is now bike-friendly was originally due to the agitation of John and a handful of his friends in the 1970s. John never stopped the effort, and now almost everyone understands the sense of it.

John is seventy-one. He has just left the middle of his life behind, entering advanced old age before his time. He is a classic example of the American working poor. But he can't work anymore. He was born poor in Detroit and he'll die poor in Philly. In between, he enjoyed good health, hard work, good friends and two excellent children. He loves the whole world.