It's Just Not Fair

..is a refrain I heard so often from D2 when she was 5 or 6, and didn't get her way. I used to tell her that if I taught her nothing else, I was a good mentor if I instilled in her the lesson that she was right: life is NOT fair.

Wifey and I decided to visit ancient mother yesterday. We picked up the granddog at D1's apartment, and then I stopped by my office to deposit a check. My friend Mike called, asking me if I had heard about the tragedy at Palmetto High --a 15 year old girl had died.

I hadn't, and Mike was calling to see if I had any connections to the family to possibly represent them. It seems there had been a medical mistake --a failure to report a bacterial infection to the girl's family, and her resultant death at Baptist Hospital.

I didn't know the family, and was glad I didn't. When I was an active PI lawyer, I would have been energized by the chance to be in a big case like that. Like an ex-smoker who is more militantly anti-tobacco than one who never smoked, I am now extremely anti the very sleazy part of my job --almost literally ambulance chasing --profiting from the misery and tragedy of others...

I realize the hypocrisy of these thoughts as I sit in a huge house and contemplate the early retirement my job brought --but it's still a relief to be away from the lurid case chasing that a succesful PI practice requires...

Anyway, Wifey and I went about our visit. Grandma was dressed up and in decent spirits. She feigned interest in her grandkids and the rest of the family, but truthfully she was concerned most about herself -- her little snow globe life, her mercifully reduced number of bowel accidents, etc...

In other words, to my jaundiced view --a person who has lived TOO long...

On the way home, I got another call --this one from a doctor friend with a connection to the dead 15 year old's family. He told me what he knew, and it appears it WAS medical malpractice, and did I want to contact the parents.

I did not. I have no connection to them, other than hearing about this terrible thing. It turns out the Mom is a court reporter. She'll have many of her clients to advise her, I'm sure...

Last night, I told Dr. Barry about it. He was skeptical that the malpractice was so clear cut. He thinks there will be more to the story than a healthy 15 year old dying mere days after seeing a pediatrician for a common sore throat.

All I know is, this am the Herald had her obituary. It was short but stinging --about all of the girl's loving family and friends --how she was so loved, and how those who lost her are so bereft.

Some get far too few years on this earth, and some get too many.

It's not fair.