Rats in a Cage

When Carrick was a young teen, she'd seemed to incessantly play a Smashing Pumpkins song that got into my head. The chorus went:

despite all my rage I am still just a rat in a cage

The lyrics popped into my head this morning when I read about a new study of rats who were given cocaine, then denied the drug for three weeks. Those who were more addicted had rewired dopamine receptors that led them to crave the drug more.

"This work shows that there are profound alterations in the brain mechanisms that regulate motivated behavior with addiction," the senior authors said in an online summary of the article that will be pulished in Neuropsychopharacology. "It really shows that the addicted person is ill-equipped to cope because the brain is now wired to make them crave drugs more and get less satisfaction out of the drug or other life events that may be rewarding, and this study found biological changes that would explain these behavioral changes."

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Heroes

Hundreds of volunteer firemen from around New York State and reportedly as far away as North Carolina stood on the double line on Warburton Ave. outside St. Matthew's Roman Catholic Church on March 10 for the funeral of Robert Schnibbe. Jr. A few minutes after 10 a.m., a caravan led by a police motorcycle and two fire engines draped with flowers turned off North Broadway and stopped in front of the church. The Westchester Country Emerald Society band marched up the street to the rat-tat-tat of the funeral dirge as the firemen, wearing only blue blazers in the unseasonably warm sunlight, snapped to attention and saluted Bob's casket as it was borne up the steps and through the doors of St. Matt's by the men who had called him "chief" for twenty four of his fifty-seven years.

The church was filled, as the priest welcomed Bob back, "for the last time," into the sacristy where he had been baptized, confirmed, and married. Loadspeakers blared the service to another couple of hundred friends and colleagues who stood outside. Bob had not only been a volunteer firefighter for all his adult life, he also had been a "go-to guy" for a myriad of organizations including his church, the local Rotary club, and our neightbood. Bob lived a block away from me. I can also tell you, from first-hand experience, that he could throw a hell of party.

Some people in the village were referring to Bob as a "fallen hero." A friend asked me if, as respected as Bob was, if "fallen hero" was the proper term to use. True, he was on duty at a fire in nearby Irvington as a Westchester County Battalion Chief, but Bob hadn't run into a burning building to rescue a toddler, or even died while manning a hose. He keeled over from a coronary blockage, which had probably been years in the making, while walking back to his car after the fire was over.

Being called a "hero" is not respect that you can earn by diligence in school or politics, like becoming a Dr. or Judge, or attain by being rich and influential. It's more about us, the survivors, than the people we (or headline writers) designate as heroes. We seach for people who have done something courageous and selfless because it takes us out of our own egos and reminds us that there is a reason to live beyond gratifying our own animal instincts. As I think about it, I do believe that there is at least as much heroism in consistently performing small acts of kindness selflessly than there is in rashly reacting in a adrenelin-fueled situation like a battle or accident.

Along those lines, I've long thought of Bob's sister Annemarie as heroic, too. She died a little more than three years ago from liver disease that resulted from her youthful addiction to alcohol and heroin. When her common-law husband, Pedro "Teo" Vega, also died from liver diease last July, I blogged about it and promised to post a profile of her. I finally have.

I think that Bob and Annemarie would both be embarrassed by our calling them heroes. They just went about their business and weren't looking for attention or accolades. They were so unassuming, in fact, that I had no idea about how many people they touched until I attended their wakes and funerals.

At Bob's wake, his mother Anne and I embraced and I felt her pain so acutely that I truly felt like I was holding my own mother.

'It isn't supposed to be this way," she said. "To bury two."

I did not, and will never have, an answer for Anne but I do feel that Annemarie and Bob both had impact on the lives of very different people in ways that will long survive their presence among us. And that's the stuff of heros.

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No One Came

Deirdre emailed me a link to an article about a substance abuse seminar in a high school Wednesday night. Here are the first few paragraphs:

After I read the story, I went to the home page of the newspaper to see where the high school was located (the Reno, Nev., area) and discovered that the site keeps track of its most viewed articles. I found it ironic that leading the list was:

1. Underage drinking numbers on the rise

Among some the stats in that article, according to the local Partnership of Community Resources, were:

• On a typical Friday or Saturday night, one in seven drivers is under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
• Vehicle crashes are the leading cause of death for 15-20-year-olds. More than 36 percent of the accidents are alcohol- or drug-related.
• Youth alcohol-related fatalities have increased every year since 1997.
• More than one-third of America's alcoholics are under the legal drinking age.
• Younger drinkers may become alcoholic in six months to three years vs. the 10-15 year pattern for adults.