NY Daily News 6/9/09
I
had lunch with my close pal Danny Gorman in Gino's in Bay Ridge
last week, the first time I'd seen him since his brother Billy
died.
I'd gotten the call May 1, and could hear the half-swallowed sob
stuck in his throat. The way he said, "How ya doin'?" told me he
wasn't doin' well at all. And when you hear that sound coming
out of this big, tough, always laughing, retired fireman, you
just know that he'd lost yet another brother.
"Billy died this morning," he said.
"Ah, geez," I said.
"I had a feeling last week," Danny said. "Something told me to
go down to Jersey to see him. I don't know what that is. You
just feel it in your bones that you're gonna lose another one.
I'm so glad I went. We had a really good talk. About being kids.
Going to PS 10, and Manual Training High. About working in
Germaine's down on Fifth Ave. together. About the time he
knocked out the loading dock foreman who was a real mean mutt."
Danny remembered that Billy took crap from nobody, even as a
kid.
"We talked about when he joined the Marines," Danny said. "About
coming home and working together in Local 197 Stone and
Derrickmen Union. About drinking in Farrell's together where his
nickname was 'Hagar the Horrible.' He was gruff, but he had a
really big heart and, man, he loved his family, his wife, Marie,
and kids Billy, Sean, Jeanette and Karen. When I saw him last
week, he was weak, in bed, but grumpy in his usual lovable way.
We had some really good laughs ..."
A week later, Danny was calling
me to say a sixth Gorman brother in 20 years had died from
cancer.
Danny is one of 11 Gorman kids, nine boys and two girls, raised
on 16th St. and Seventh Ave. in Park Slope. Neither of their
parents died from cancer. But somewhere along the line, the
insidious gene invaded the bloodline.
Eddie, a telephone worker, died at age 50 about 20 years ago;
then, 10 years later, Harry, a machinist, died at 66; then, FDNY
Lt. Johnny Gorman died at 66, a few years later, followed by
FDNY Chief Jerry Gorman, at 54, and then Joe, a Kodak executive,
died last year at 73. And now, Billy at 68.
That's too much cancer misery for any family.
But in typical fireman style, Danny mined for a laugh.
"It's why I don't wanna spend any money," Danny said, laughing.
"My dentist wants to charge me $25,000 for implants. I told him,
unless he can guarantee I get to use them for 15 years, it's a
bad investment. Besides, with the cancer in my family, I don't
want anyone drilling in my bones. He's likely to hit oil."
We ate bowls of pasta and plates of tartufo, symbols of life,
and yakked more about Billy. "I asked my brother Charlie what
stuck in his mind about Billy," Danny said. "He remembered a day
they were working a construction job. Both suffered from chronic
heartburn. Charlie asked Billy for one of his Tums. Billy fished
in his pocket, took out a fresh pack and one dirty old Tums,
last one in an old wrapper, covered in pocket lint. Billy gave
Charlie the dirty Tums. Charlie asked for a clean Tums from the
new pack. Billy said, 'Nah, I didn't open them yet.' Me and
Charlie howled laughing because that was Billy, man..."
Danny says losing brothers is bad enough, but it looks like this
gene is passing on.
"My brother Harry's grandson, Peter, is 8 years old, an
absolutely beautiful kid," he said. "And he's up in
Sloan-Kettering with brain cancer. And my brother Jerry's
grandson, Aidan, 4, woke up mysteriously blind last Christmas.
It's beyond heartbreaking when it's kids. But that gorgeous
little guy just got back sight in one eye through steroid
treatment, so we have some hope in the family."
More hope just came home for summer vacation from Brown
University in Providence, R.I., where Danny's brilliant daughter
Megan is in premed with the goal of being a pediatric
oncologist.
"That's what she wants to do in life," Danny says. "She wants to
help kids with cancer."
Last week, Danny went to City Hall, where a nephew named Tate
Hunt, a firefighter with Ladder 166 in Coney Island, received
the Albert Johnson Medal, a Class FDNY award, for a heroic
rescue of a 75-year-old in a fire last year.
Bravery and community service are two more genes that run deep
in the Gorman bloodline.
"Losing so many brothers is like living a terrible rerun," Danny
says. "Every time you turn around, the same good people are
saying how sorry they are. I'm just glad I got to see my brother
Billy before he went. He was a really good guy. Man, we had a
load of laughs ..."
dhamill@nydailynews.com
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