SAN FRANCISCO -- Slowly, they began to clap. First one, then two, then all of them, applauding, cheering, these rescue workers who have been days without a smile, covered in dirt, performing the most gruesome task that humans can be asked to perform: removing the dead. The bodies were mangled. Crushed. Some beyond recognition. And suddenly, miraculously, a heartbeat, a breath of life.A man named Bucky Helm, trapped since Tuesday's earthquake in the wreckage of the Nimitz Freeway.
If Herschel Walker, whose talents still did not lead to a single victory for the Dallas Cowboys this season, was worth 12 players, a new house, a Mercedes and an extra $1.5 million cash above his salary, just think what other NFL stars might fetch:* Eric Dickerson: 15 players, three condominiums, $2 million cash and a lifetime supply of goggles.* Randall Cunningham: 23 players, apartment complex, $3 million and a Coca-Cola bottling plant. * Joe Montana: 45 players, most of Bloomfield Hills, $8 million and General Motors.
SAN FRANCISCO -- I am writing this column in the most frightening position I have ever been in, some 200 feet above the ground in Candlestick Park, which just moments ago was shaking as if the entire stadium were on a wagon being wheeled over cobblestone. An earthquake, they call it out here, with some regularity, and even as I type these words, the stadium occasionally rolls -- aftershocks -- with the concrete, the steel supports, everything shaking, as if suddenly there is no such thing as sturdy, not anymore.
Mitch Albom writes about running an orphanage in impoverished Port-au-Prince, Haiti, his kids, their hardships, laughs and challenges, and the life lessons he’s learned there every day.
