Life After Death in the Time of Covid-19

Three men who helped shape my life died during the dark spring of 2020

Between April 25 and May 19, 2020 my father, one of my oldest friends, and my most important mentor all died. Nelson Elmer George from Covid-19 complications in April. Andre Oneal Harrell from a heart attack May 7. Robert ‘Rocky’ Ford May 19 from what his wife described as natural causes. They were black men aged 87, 58 and 70. My father had lived the life of minimum wage worker after serving in the Korean War, his last major gig was as an security guard at City College of New York. Andre had been an MC, president of the crucial new jack swing label Uptown Records and an mentor to many, including Sean Combs. Rocky had been a staffer at Billboard magazine before becoming a record producer and talent scout with Kurtis Blow and Full Force among the many he helped crack the record industry.

None were killed by police, were politically outspoken, or the types he joined marches. Their names will not used as symbols of society’s ills. Their deaths did not turn them into martyrs. Yet in the year Black Lives Matter became an international rallying cry, the passing of these non-controversial, non-activists moved me as deeply as those lives that ended in public. State sanctioned violence should always cause outrage and protest.

But I found my truest heartbreak in the quieter drama of black men who’s lives shaped mine, their families and the corners of America in which they toiled. The…