Ralph Gage, RIP
The whys and wherefores don’t really matter; indeed, they’ve basically turned to dust. What matters is that I had seen the end coming, had arranged to move onto a lucrative new job elsewhere in media, and then — once everything had been put into motion — got my feelings hurt. I reacted badly. I went around the newsroom, shook hands, made it plain that I was full of rage, gathered up my belongings and rather ostentatiously marched out the front door. It was impetuous, and probably stupid. I was 34, married a bit more than a year, had a few nice awards under my belt and considered myself somewhat ambitious. I was still young enough to think I had a future.
What I didn’t count on was a series of cascading failures: The economy, the media industry, my health. I really didn’t have a clear-eyed view of my own foibles, for that matter, and how they could bring me down.
When my health went, in 2011, I was already at the end of my rope: I’d lost my job in Philadelphia the year before — it still hurts to write that — and was broke, with a wife and young son to support and no idea how to do it. A sudden brush with death brought me to my lowest point. It felt like nothing could ever be good again.
That’s when Ralph Gage reached out to me.
Ralph was a longtime veteran of the Journal-World. He was a journalist and then managing editor, general manager and eventually chief operating officer of the company. He was known in the newsroom for having a gruff personality. He could be scary, frankly. When I burned my bridges at the paper, I figured he was one of the people I had burned. But while I was in the hospital, he reached out to me on Facebook — checking to see if I was OK, if he could offer any support, rooting me on as I recovered.
It was humbling. I never expected to hear a good word from him again — and, to repeat, I probably didn’t deserve to. He didn’t owe me any kind of grace. He gave it freely.
And he gave it again when I returned to Lawrence from Philly, eight years after I’d left. He wrote to several people who had the ability to give work to freelancers, vouching for me and asking them to send some assignments my way. I didn’t ask for it. He didn’t have to do it. And that support was meaningful.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve had the good fortune to make a bit of peace with a number of people that I thought I’d broken with. It’s such a relief to let go of grudges, to free yourself of the burden of anger. I’m great at carrying that anger, to my eternal detriment. I don’t think Ralph intended to serve as an object lesson in the power of grace — I don’t think I ever let him know how much his kindnesses meant to me. I’m not sure I would’ve known how to have that kind of talk with him. Now I won’t get a chance: He passed away this weekend.
So I’ve tried to learn from his actions toward me — to be more careful about recognizing the human beings whom I deal with, to remember that they’re more than the sum of their interactions with me, have more facets and needs and wants than I’m capable of perceiving. To consider their pain instead of using it as an excuse to return anger for anger. I am not good at this stuff yet. I might never be. All I know is I didn’t expect to learn those lessons from Ralph. Life is funny.
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