Burying the lead, making her pitch

By Jon Solomon

I received a bizarre e-mail from Casey on March 19 updating her situation.

Her first five paragraphs were spent asking about my new job; wishing she could watch college baseball in the South and out of the snow; wondering how my NCAA bracket was going; complaining that her brother successfully picked Manhattan over Florida; whining that my school, Maryland, defeated her Dookies in the
ACC final; and ranting that South Carolina lost in the NCAAs, calling it a sad day in Gamecock Nation (the lame nickname she stole from her beloved Red Sox).

The sixth graf: Casey’s cancer had returned, the reason she was writing with this “depressing news,” as she called it.

Typical Casey. She buried the lead.

Except for Casey, the lead was never conventional. If it were, would we miss her the way we do now?

I am crushed about Casey leaving us far, far too soon. She and I had a unique relationship – wasn’t every relationship of hers unique? – as colleagues in Anderson, S.C., and later after she left.

I got to witness her antics up close each day in the newsroom. Let’s just say she was far from a perfect employee early on, and leave it at that. I endured the challenge first-hand when I briefly became her boss and kept her from covering a South Carolina baseball series in the NCAA Tournament.

Later, when Casey got sick, we were able to speak candidly about her illness. My sister survived cancer on two occasions a while ago, and I held that out as a carrot for Casey.

Just fight a little more, I urged her. Compile a plan to beat it. Ask lots of questions. Keep fighting, Casey. Keep fighting. Jessica’s been cancer-free for so long now, you can do it, too. She ran the L.A. Marathon, Casey. You can run Boston some day.

She finally met Jessica at my wedding in November, the last time I saw her. Casey called it one of the highlights of her weekend.

In typical Casey fashion, she was often scared to talk about her illness. Mostly, she was scared about how other people would react, so she sheltered many of us.

I imagine she felt it was easier for us to handle. Casey loved putting others first. A relative of hers told me that in Casey’s final days, she was apologetic about not helping a cousin with his school project as she had promised.

In subsequent e-mails after her cancer returned, Casey discussed writing something to help young adults through cancer diagnosis.

“It’s too lofty to call it a book,” she wrote modestly, and perhaps correctly. “It’s not only giving me something to do to get my mind working, which is a really nice feeling, but it could end up helping somebody else. But even if I’m the only one who ever sees it, I think it will be a useful project.”

It’s hard to say how far along she had gone with the project. There are countless notebooks her family must go through – some of them empty and some with only a handful of random thoughts – and maybe more writings on her computer.

If anyone has e-mail messages or letters Casey sent about her illness that you feel comfortable sharing, please send it to Matt or myself. My e-mail address is jonsol@yahoo.com. Perhaps one day enough thoughts will be compiled to let Casey help cancer patients deal with their suffering the way she helped us live.

Since Casey first became ill, I have thought about her in relation to a story she wrote in May 2000. The topic was a high school softball pitcher coping with her father’s sudden death. It is still one of my proudest moments, because I helped edit it and pushed Casey to keep digging for more information.

When Casey put her mind to it, she could achieve anything. She knew it; we all knew it. That’s why she beat cancer so many times.

In this particular story, Casey’s ability to speak so freely with people was exquisite. She unearthed delicate details about the softball pitcher’s relationship with her father. Casey’s lead:

PENDLETON, S.C. – There was never a moment’s doubt in her mind.
Pendleton High School softball pitcher Brooke Norris may have worried about how she would throw, or whether she’d be able to make it through the game, but she knew she had to be on the mound.
With more than 300 spectators to support her and an empty chair behind the backstop where her father Tommy always sat, Brooke offered the best tribute she could to the man, who died of a heart attack Saturday morning.
She pitched.

I don’t know when or how I will fill the hole vacated by Casey’s death. I like to think now that her March 19 e-mail was not her burying the lead, but rather Casey writing exactly the way she lived.

She made her pitch. We must somehow keep carrying it, for Casey and for ourselves.

Jon worked with Casey at the Anderson Independent Mail. He currently covers Clemson for The State.