Trump Kills My Dead Dad (Updated).
Fuck you all the way to Hell, Trump.
My Dad, James Michael Duffy, worked at a DuPont chemical plant for 37 years as a Millwright/Pipe Fitter. He was 6’-4” with arms like Popeye. He was a meticulous worker, laying out all his tools before starting a job. He worked in buildings filled with the viliest shit on earth, including an HF (Hydrofluoric Acid) building. The last building he worked in was making an additive to make rubber last longer (for tires) It was so toxic, a few parts per million were lethal to inhale.
He retied at 60 with asbestosis. He had about 50% usage of both of his lungs. The fact that my dad started distance running in 1968, and was still doing it when he retired saved his life. I beat him in a race one (1) time, a 10K. At 70, he couldn't run anymore, but he could kayak faster and longer than you or me.
DuPont had of course shielded themselves from asbestos lawsuits by then. The on-plant doctor (free!) kept his asbestosis hidden from him via corporate directive.
In 2012, after suffering through months of debilitating back and rib pain, he was diagnosed with third stage multiple myeloma. It was incurable. He had six months or six years left, depending on his response to treatment.
I was so angry when hearing the bad news, I wanted to beat the shit out of somebody; the back doctor who missed the lesions on his spine in an x-ray; the CEO of DuPont. Although doctors don't for sure know the cause of multiple myeloma, one of the main contributing factors is “prolonged exposure to dangerous chemicals”.
He died on September 21st, 2014, I was there to hug him as he took his last breath.
I will yell in utter joy when Trump dies.
Several of my Dad’s DuPont co-workers/friends also developed asbestosis. Their ailments metastasized into mesothelioma, and they soon died. Horrible painful suffocating deaths.
Trump of course loves asbestos because it’s related to “building”, his favorite thing in his pathetic life. Towers. Walls. Gold everything. He hates nature and animals. His idea of “nature” is a city park with lots of statues. Or, a fucking gold course.
Yes, it is “the mob” (subhead, above) that kills an average of forty-thousand Americans every year.
My Dad, at retirement, had an advanced (at the time) “athletic” pacemaker installed, one that allowed his heart rate to climb well above average, so he could keep exercising vigoriously with 50% lung usage—again the thing that saved his life from asbestosis.
He went through—among many other things—two major back surgeries, shoulder surgery, hip surgery, several ( I lost count) hand surgeries: pulling on six-foot wrenches all those years gave him incredibly strong but desensitized hands. He could grab any boiling hot pot and feel nothing.
He also got the bends on one of his deep scuba diving outings 60 miles off-shore, 200 feet down. It was his partner’s fault—lack of communication. He was helicopter-lifted to Mt. Sinai hospital here in NYC. He spent several hours in a hyperbaric chamber, which saved him the use of his legs. His partner wasn’t so lucky: he ended up with one leg permanently paralyzed.
All of this is to say: my Dad was an incredibly strong man, mentally and physically. As he lay dying, and I was sad and ragingly mad, he told me: “Mark, I’ve had a good life, a great wife, and I’m so proud of you. Don’t be mad, don’t be sad”.
And not only for that, which could be more than enough.