A Nice Lunch Missed, Forever
On the desk before me as I write these words is a scrap of paper bearing Andrew Breitbart’s email address and phone number, written in his own hand about six weeks ago. I was walking past a coffee house and saw him seated at an outdoor table, engaged in conversation with a man who, if I recall correctly, was interviewing him for the Malibu Times. I abandoned all sense of decorum and approached, introducing myself by my pseudonym in the hope that he had heard of me and, in case he hadn’t, adding that we had a mutual friend in Rob Long.
To my astonishment he said he had enjoyed reading my work and suggested we go to lunch, then wrote down his contact information on a scrap of paper which he tore from a legal pad. There I was, the most minor of figures in the conservative commentariat, barging in on the man who was arguably its most influential, yet he could have not been more gracious, even when I barged in a second time to report that the scrap of paper he had given me had blown away within a minute my of leaving him. He wrote out the information a second time and repeated the lunch invitation, and off I went to report the encounter to my wife.
We never had that lunch. I sent an email that went unanswered, then, knowing how impossibly busy he was, pondered what to do next. I was still pondering this morning when I learned he had died.
A few weeks ago I was at the Police Academy near Dodger Stadium and saw some fire trucks and an ambulance parked outside. I learned that a fellow officer, one not much older than I, had collapsed and died while playing racquetball. He was a man who had spent more than twenty years as a cop, surviving God knows how many scrapes with death before settling into the relative safety of a job behind a desk. And he died playing racquetball.
And Andrew Breitbart died while taking a walk. At 43.
It’s true what they say: You just never know.
I wish I had called him. It would have been a nice lunch.
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Comments:
Apr '11
Re: A Nice Lunch Missed, Forever
JD, it sounds to me that just your momentary encounter left quite an impression with his willingness to share his information not once, but twice.
From what I'm hearing, shared by those who knew and loved him, is that he was a man who could boo and jeer you when he was against what you stood for, but cheer you for being a fellow human being, worthy of love and respect.
Nov '10
Re: A Nice Lunch Missed, Forever
This might seem lame but....*hug*.
He did give you a story to tell. I am sad beyond measure. And I'm just a schmo.
Don't regret the lunch you didn't have. Just remember the tenacity it took to go back again and get the email address. I think that's important. Do what matters. Sometimes it takes more than one try. And of course, live each day as though it were your last.
None of that is easy...for me at least.
May '10
Re: A Nice Lunch Missed, Forever
I'm sorry you didn't get that lunch, too. At least you did get to meet him.