In weary world, kindness
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It’s been a lousy week: The death toll from the COVID-19 pandemic broke 100,000 even as the nation continued the difficult — and potentially dangerous — project of piecemeal reopenings; the deaths of black people at the hands of police prompted civil strife in Minneapolis and Louisville, Ky.; and the president seemed hellbent on using this particular moment of multifocal national distress to take us on a deranged social-media joyride through his subconscious.
So who’s up for a story with a happy ending? Or at least a provisional positive outcome, which is about as good as we’re going to get these days.
Last week in this space, I wrote about Jamie L. Smith, who recently moved from Poughkeepsie to Albany and until March worked as a supervisor with a local hotel chain. She has three children living at home; her youngest son has battled illnesses throughout his life and last year received his second heart transplant, a situation that fills Smith with fear for what might happen if COVID-19 hits her home.
Two months after applying for unemployment benefits, she was still waiting and was having no luck getting anyone at the state Labor Department to respond. Smith was desperate.
The column appeared online Saturday afternoon and in print Sunday morning. I woke up to a text from state Assemblyman John Mcdonald.
“Do you have the contact info for Jamie Smith?” he wrote. “Her case is similar to the hundreds we deal with and we have a direct link to DOL to help move things along. If you can share I would like to assist her. Thanks.”
About the same time, I got the first of what would be a steady stream of emails from readers who wanted to offer direct aid to Smith’s household.
As her story moved around social media, I was struck by what I see: No one — not one single solitary troll — made any sort of comment suggesting that Smith was partially responsible for her situation, the sort of bogus remarks that unfortunately are endemic when we write stories about people facing economic hardship.
Instead, all I heard was people expressing sympathy, offering advice for getting action out of the state bureaucracy, or wanting Smith’s number in order to lend a hand in the form of help with food, gift cards for her kids and more.
Mcdonald spoke to Smith that morning (“a great guy,” she said) and put her in touch with a Labor Department program manager who spotted a previously undiagnosed problem with her application — something that doesn’t appear to have been her fault but caused the form to get “all jacked up,” she said.
An expedited debit card was