The Wright Thing

This month marks the first anniversary of Hurricane Sandy, the superstorm that dealt much of the Northeast a crippling blow. The loss of life and property was staggering; an estimated 250 people were killed as a result of the storm, and property damage was measured in the billions. That was particularly true of the New York-New Jersey metropolitan area, where some homes in low-lying areas were smashed to bits and others were burned to the ground. Millions more were without power for over a week.

While recovery has been remarkable for the most part, some sections were not as lucky. There are people still struggling to put their lives back together a year later . . . and others are making sure you don’t forget about them.

One of them is David Wright, who is using his celebrity as third baseman and captain of the New York Mets to shepherd a program that honors both the victims of Sandy and the heroes who saw them through it. He couldn’t be more serious about the cause, as he told Denis Hamill of the New York Daily News:

“After the storm I met a lot of the kids who were displaced by Sandy. New York is my second home, a city that’s been very good to me, and so when I visited some of the neighborhoods that were destroyed by Sandy, my heart went out to these people.”

Wright rolled up his sleeves right away. First he donated $250,000 to a fund that was aiding relief for Sandy victims, and then he set up his own program – which he called, appropriately enough, The Wright Thing.

“So many people did great things during and after the storm,” he explained to Hamill. “We wanted to honor some of them in some small way, let them know that we don’t forget once the storm is over.”

One of those people is NYFD Firefighter Tommy Wood of Belle Harbor, Queens, who was off-duty at the time but immediately went into rescue mode. With his 14-year-old son Brendan, he got in a kayak and, ignoring the flames shooting forth all around him, evacuated 25 of his neighbors to safer ground – including a woman in a wheelchair. Wright saw to it that he had a day of his own at the Mets’ home stadium of Citi Field in August, where he greeted other Met players and had his family introduced to the crowd.

Then there’s Elaine Wepa Gil of Staten Island, who showed up at a high school there where 900 people were temporarily displaced and, with a costume of her own, hosted a Halloween party for the 200 kids among them. With her husband she organized a volunteer outreach program that found people in battered homes who were cold and hungry, and in addition set up a collection point in her own basement for all the supplies that were coming in. She, too, had a day at Citi Field with her family, courtesy of Wright.

“We want to honor people like Tommy and Elaine,” he said. “To say we haven’t forgotten. Mostly I want to meet these heroes so I can have the chance to say, ‘Thank you.’”

A good idea? Seems wonderful from here. And maybe “The Wright Thing” is a little gimmicky, true. But who’s to say it isn’t a perfect fit?

(This essay is a recent “Light One Candle” column, written by Jerry Costello, of The Christophers; it is one of a series of weekly columns that deal with a variety of topics and current events.)

Background information:

The Christophers: Christopher Radio & Video