It's Sunday night at the end of Spring Break, and I'm just getting over the fever I caught one week ago after slamming oysters with Mark Dorosin and Jackson Mabry at New Bern's Raw Bar this past Tuesday night. All dietary regrets aside, I'm shivering from a pro bono mountaintop high when I think about our few days in the coastal plains.
I will never forget the face of a client, who lives in between alot of places outside of New Bern, as she said she just wanted to know what would happen to her land when she died. And I will never forget her joy in describing a still-working watch given by a sweetheart who died soon after giving it to her - her only luxury item - which she could now preserve for the wrist of her great-granddaughter.
Often the needs of the young are emphasized - right to a good education, right to marry, right to speak up, right to accumulate property, etc - but the rights of poor seniors are not as eagerly advocated or even considered. And the right to peace of mind in the face of death is one of those rights we would rather not think about, though it springs from our condition in the same way that other protected human impulses do.
I barely escaped Chapel Hill on early Monday morning, in a way looking for relief of my own from the monstrous schedule of study, activities, and relationships that I try to maintain. What I found were people who needed skills that I am learning, and who had been totally unaffected by the busyness of life in Chapel Hill.
Thank you ENC!
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