The Old Men of the Wing Chun Class
Three days a week (actually, one morning and two evenings) I make a 12-mile trip to an unremarkable business park in Centennial, Colorado. The dojo space is simple and not very large: a scuffed, painted concrete floor, dingy white walls covered with a variety of plaques, Asian-inspired pictures, portraits of Wing Chun masters and official […]
When Will “We” Fight Back?
The man you see pulling the old-school gurney up a NYC transit ramp was Paramedic Richard McAllen, an EMS Paramedic who started on the job in the early 1970s. Rich graduated Jacobi Hospital’s first paramedic class in 1974. Ironically, I was in the last class in 1984. Rich would be considered a dinosaur by today’s […]
The Sea of Peroxide: A Paramedic’s Journey Through The Dawn of The AIDS Crisis in New York City
As I write this reflection, my new book has been available for about a week. I am still in a sort of post writing shock. It is a memoir and cut close to my soul. I have been asked how I remembered so much in the way of specific detail; for example, the color of […]