Monday Commercial Break

Our grandfather, Mark E Stroock II (1922-2018), was for 50 years an ad man with Young and Rubicam. That's the big time, people, real Mad Men stuff, which, by the way the old bastard always said was 100% right except for one thing. By 1960 ad agencies were run by Italian art directors and Jewish copy men. 'Talent' he said. 

As this week marks the one year anniversary of our grandfather's passing, we'll be posting commercials in which we know he had a hand.

Sticking with our airline theme, the people of Eastern Airlines:

Monday Metal

I got nothing folks.

Here's my grandfather's second wife playing his favorite song at the Algonquin. I'm pretty sure he's holding the camera. That's bassist Jay Leonhardt in the background.

Notes on a Car Accident

On Saturday, driving from Frank Campbell's Funeral Home in Midtown up the Bronx River Parkway our funeral procession was damn near taken out in a car accident.

We heard a loud BANG and saw the limo in front of us come to a quick stop and then a white car go flying off the road.  We slammed on the breaks and managed to maintain a safe distance, as did our brother-in-law behind us. Good thing we were a funeral procession doing about 45 MPH rather than normal commuters doing 65 or 70. Mrs. Stroock, herself rattled as we were, pointed out that our parents were up ahead.

After everyone in our vehicle was calmed down we got out and ran forward to check if anyone in our procession was in the wreck. Thankfully no one in our party was caught in the accident.

But before us we say a large red pickup on it's side. It's bed cap was overturned and there was landscaping equipment all over the parkway. Others were out of their cars helping. One young man called 9-11 while another checked on the white car we saw and a smashed black car next to it. Both drivers were out and unharmed. We looked inside the pickup and saw a man staring back at us. He was pressed up against the door and his airbag was deployed. We waved. He looked understandably confused and scared and waved back. 

A man standing next to me said, 'What's that smoke coming out of the cabin?'

Another said, 'It's just from the airbag.'

Phew. No fire to deal with.

The truck's passenger side was pointed to the sky and here a man was attempting to climb out over the air bag. We saw a hand, reached out and grabbed it to show that others were there to help. I asked if he wanted me to pop the airbag and he said he was using it to climb up. 'It's helping me,' were his exact words.

Somehow a bunch of plain clothes cops were already on scene and swarming all over the pickup. We saw their handcuffs and guns. They climbed on top of the bed cap and asked me to stand on it to keep it steady. They got both men out. It seemed each had a some broken bones but were otherwise ok.

Afterword we recall picking up junk and hauling it to the side of the road. One lane was open but covered in glass. A car was trying to go through but we waved and pointed and shouted, 'It's glass, you'll pop your tires!'

The unformed cops were there by then and trying to shut the parkway down. I said, 'That's a funeral procession over there.' The cop said hurry up before the fire department arrived and shut the whole parkway down.

Cars were starting to move through the one open lane. We got back in the car and drove ahead. beyond the accident the good men from Frank Campbell's waited to re-assemble the procession. Away we went to Ferncliffe Cemetery.

We don't remember anything about the rest of the ride.

Day of 3-4

By Sunday my grandfather was in a hospital bed (at home) and mostly unconscious with brief periods of alertness.

I took my oldest into Manhattan to see him one last time. We got there about 10:30. He was awake. The oldest said a few things and played violin. He said 'thank you', the last words ever uttered by him to me, and clapped once.

We stayed several hours, mostly just kibitzing with our sister and father. Paw Paw took the oldest with him to Starbucks, and got her a grande venti mocha-chino latte fumerello-whatever. Boy was he in trouble with Mrs. Stroock.

I took the oldest back to New Jersey about 3 and we got home about 4:30. This was enough time for us to unwind a bit. As we were breaking out the leftovers for dinner my sister called to say that his blood pressure had dropped again and was now extremely weak. What did I want to do? I sat down and ate some Chinese. By the time I finished I knew I was heading back into Manhattan. It was about 6. I stopped at Dunkin Donuts for a coffee and went back in.  The ride through the Lincoln was easy, and the drive up Park Avenue, around Grand Central and through the Met Life building was quick. I got to the apartment about 7:30.

I watched the nurse take his blood pressure, and was oddly disappointed when it remained steady. I wanted this over with. So did he. After idle chit-chat I sat by my grandfather's side for a few minutes and watched his breathing slow and stop. It was 9 on the dot.

The nurses took his blood pressure and said he was gone. We could not call the funeral home until the Hospice nurse arrived to do an official pronouncement. Took about an hour.

I left about 12:15. Back down Manhattan and through the Lincoln. There is no better view of Manhattan then on the approach to the Lincoln. The city really is breathtaking at night and photos don't do it justice.

Then the long drive down the Turnpike and over Interstate 78 home. What does one listen to on the ride home after watching one's grandfather pass in his sleep? I chose Queen. I dunno.

We got home about 2:30.

Later I talked to my sister, and she said our grandfather wasn't really awake at all after she got there about noon. Our oldest playing the violin for him was the last thing he saw and heard.

Mark Stroock II (III)

Mark Stroock, at the Algonquin, Christmas 2017

Mark Stroock II (II)

Mark Stroock II, my grandfather, was a sickly boy in the 1920's when things like polio, asthma and TB were killing sickly boys. As noted before, he was so sickly the army kept rejecting him. In World War II.

He never expected to reach 75 much less 95.

From 90 he was beset with illnesses that nag most of us but threaten the life of a nonagenarian. In 2012 he had a bad fall that required a hip replacement. He checked into the hospital and we never expected him to check out. Foolish us for doubting his indomitable will. When his second wife died last February we didn't think we'd have long to wait. He hung on for another 13 months, which just shocked the hell out of us.

Frankly, at time we wondered what he was waiting for.

Five weeks ago he was diagnosed with bladder cancer at which point he decided, hell with it. He wasn't going to go through all that at 95. He stayed at home with palliative and Hospice care. He was coherent until about noon yesterday and unconscious thereafter. Over the course of the afternoon his blood pressure dropped until nine sharp, when he passed peacefully. We're glad to say we were at his side and brought our father and sister into the room.

There's a heck of a joke in the events that transpired over the next few minutes, and one day we'll tell it.

These Are the Guys Who Want to Live Forever

Via Kathy Shaidle, an article about trans-humanists:

The apparent paradox, then, is that so many transhumanists, while bent on defeating or ‘solving’ death, also seem rather, well, misanthropic. To be transhumanist is on some level also to be anti-humanist: people tell O’Connell what contemptible ‘monkeys’ current humans are, how disgusting it is that they are doing all this breeding, and how they’d rather be machine-based consciousnesses exploring the vastness of space. But when it comes down to it, you might think there is not all that much to distinguish this, as a consummation devoutly to be wished, from good old-fashioned death.

Creeps. You know whose like that? The sociopathic, Asperger ridden Sheldon Cooper from the Big Bang theory. Anyone want to live with that? Or how about the evil doctor from Forbidden Planet? These guys are from another world.

For that matter, who wants to live forever? We're going to break our prohibition against Steve Guttenberg films [you blogged The Day After-ed] and recall watching Cocoon. Here a gaggle of geezers was being swept away by benevolent aliens to live forever. At ten years old I didn't like the idea.

Does anyone really want to be like that Eye-talian woman who just died at 117? She outlived her kids and grand kids.

Fifteen years ago we watched a dear old aunt die because she had a bad fall and the doctors wanted to amputate her leg. She refused. My uncle was eight years gone and she was alone in a big house and decided that at 87 it was time to go.

Of course my grandfather is 94. He has his brains and can get around. But want to talk about being from another world? He remembers people who fought in the Civil War, he watched both the Lincoln Tunnel and GWB get built. And he just buried his second wife.

No thanks.