So much about the coronavirus and how we comprehend it has been a story of data and daily tallies. The numbers of cases, positive tests ... and deaths.
But those who died were so much more than a number to the loved ones they left behind. As Rhode Island surpasses the sad milestone of 1000 lives lost, let the stories of a few speak of the true loss.
JOSEPHINE A. McCORMICK, 93, of East Greenwich. Died April 27.
She stood shy of five-feet, this mother of six, but what she gave up in height, she made up for with spunk.
Her daughter Cheryl Brown remembers that time around 1972 when she came home with a Volkswagen Karmann Ghia she bought to take to college.
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You didnt pay the sticker price, did you? her mother, a daughter of the Depression, wanted to know.
Well, she had, actually.
We marched down to the dealership and she read them the riot act of how they had taken advantage of her daughter, says Brown. When we got home, the dealership called and said, Okay, come on back. Well take some off the price.
Family meant everything to Josephine McCormick, who scheduled the annual holiday gathering for Christmas Eve, so everyone could attend and still meet their in-law obligations on Christmas day.
Which made her passing, alone at the hospital because of the virus, crushingly hard on those she left behind.
She always made you feel special, her daughter says, and we couldnt even hold her hand.
MARIE OCONNELL, 80, of Pawtucket. Died April 18.
She was a former nun, with a butterfly tattoo on her lower back and a penchant for casino slots.
For 30 years, Marie OConnell served the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary, caring for the poor in New Guinea for a decade starting in the late 1960s. But she eventually moved on from the convent, while remaining a devout Mass attendee at St. Teresa Church.
She loved visiting the slots at Twin River with her sister Janet OConnell, 75, also a former nun, and their widowed sister-in-law, Dorothy OConnell, 80. The Three Amigos called their trips to the casino Maries casino therapy after she developed ovarian cancer.
On April 11 she was admitted to Miriam Hospital, suffering from Covid-19. She went downhill quickly.
The OConnells never liked words like died. Too sad. They adopted code phrases like The Eagle has landed or, as when brother Robert passed, He got on the bus.
The staff at Miriam understood. When it was time for the doctor to pass along the sad news to Maries niece, he followed the code: Your aunt has gone to the casino.
ALFRED SONNY SOUZA, 96, of East Providence. Died May 10.
Alfred Sonny Souza went to war at 19, had his troop transport ship sink a day after D-Day, but survived to come home and start his own business, the Custom Woodworking Co., of East Providence.
The company made, among other items, the book racks that the publishing company Simon & Schuster used in bookstores to display their paperbacks and CliffsNotes study guides.
I can still remember the time we went into a market in Ogunquit Beach [in Maine] and right there, there was an old rack with the words: product of Custom Woodworking company, East Providence, Rhode Island, says his daughter Deborah Stephens, of Cape Coral, Florida.
A former Seekonk resident, Sonny regularly participated in the reunions with his World War II Navy crew members from the USS Susan B. Anthony. The ship struck a mine on June 7, 1944. All 2,689 people aboard were saved.
He was the youngest in the family but like so many raised through The Depression, says his daughter, was one of those self-made people.
NANCY L. MacDONALD, 74, of East Providence. Died April 25.
Nancy MacDonald was known as the first smile that visitors and colleagues saw when they entered Orchard View Manor in East Providence.
She worked the reception desk at the Riverside nursing home, second shift. But as the coronavirus began invading the states assisted care facilities, she confided in her daughter Bethany her growing fear.
She was scared to death, her daughter says. She didnt want to catch COVID and die alone. But another receptionist was out sick, so she was covering for her, too.
Nancy MacDonald lived her entire life in Riverside, her daughter says. She served as a teaching assistant at Riverside Middle School, and as a cheerleading coach, for some 20 years until she retired about a decade ago.
Everyone knew her and knew the kindness she so readily dispensed.
She was a very, very giving person, says Bethany. She would give you her last dollar if you needed it.
ANTHONY SUARES, 76, of East Providence. Died April 15.
Hed overcome a childhood bout with polio to become a Teamster and an avid dancer.
Anthony Suares, 76, did the jitterbug and danced to Cape Verdean music at the social club in East Providence with his wife, Ruth. As he got older, Alzheimers made the things he loved most in life more difficult, but they did not rob him of the joy he could find wherever he was.
Ruth would visit him just about every day at Orchard View Manor, the nursing home where he lived in the last years of his life.
Hed have the biggest grin on his face, he would just light up, Ruth recalled.
On April 9, Ruth learned that her husband had tested positive for COVID-19. She still called him every day, and sing songs shed made up: I cant wait to see you, I need to hold you, so always remember, Im right there with you.
Early on April 15, the nursing home called to tell Ruth that Anthony had died. The months since have been difficult, but Ruth has found comfort in her faith that theyll meet again.
When its my time to make that journey, Ruth said recently, I know my Tony will be at Gods gate with a big smile and open arms and say, Welcome home, babe. May I have this dance?
EARL SWEENEY, 97, of Cumberland and Woonsocket. Died April 22.
He was a Navy veteran whod had a first-hand view of World War II victory: He was on a ship in Tokyo Bay when Japan formally surrendered to end the war, his family said.
After his Navy service, Earl Sweeney graduated from the University of Rhode Island, became an engineer, married Irene Audette, and had three boys, Bryan, Michael and Steven. Bryan died young, and Earl kept a shattered family together. Irene died just shy of their 50th wedding anniversary.
Earls longevity was in his genes. The longtime Cumberland resident whose mom lived to 103 was still competing in senior track and field meets into his 80s.
In early April, though, while recuperating from a hospital visit at the Oakland Grove nursing home in Woonsocket, he tested positive for the coronavirus. On April 21, Steven had a chance to call his father not visit him, as they would have done otherwise and say goodbye.
I said, Pop, we love you, Steven said. I remember him saying, I love you. It was very brief and short, but at least we had that conversation.
Earl died on April 22. In his 97 years, he had seen and done so much.
He lived to 97, Steven Sweeney said. What more can you ask?
BERNIE LANZI, 79, of North Providence. Died March 30.
His nickname was the Mayor of Golden Crest.
Bernie Lanzi was always holding court when his family would visit him at his nursing home -- telling jokes, playing games, flipping through a word search book.
A shy kid growing up, Lanzi became more outgoing after his long and slow recovery from surgery to remove a tumor on his pituitary gland 30 years ago. He was shy no more: As part of the rehabilitation, he took up ballroom dancing.
He lit up a room, said his sister, Sandra LoBello.
Lanzi, 79, was among the states first coronavirus-associated deaths in a pandemic that would sweep through nursing homes, including his own. He died on March 30, at 79.
He was a deeply faithful Catholic, and the isolation that COVID forced on everyone only adds to the pain his family felt. He deserved a sendoff in church. He deserved to have someone holding his hand at the end.
Thats the thing thats tearing up my heart, LoBello said. Ive always been with him.
BILL CALDARONE, 100, of Cranston. Died May 6. JILL CALDARONE, 100, of Cranston. Died May 20.
Because of the times, only 10 loved ones were able to say goodbye to Jill Caldarone, lost to the virus in May at age 100.
She was a mom, master gardener, real-estate agent and military wife.
In early June, she was laid to rest at the states Veterans Cemetery in Exeter beside her husband, Bill.
He was also 100 when the same illness took him only two weeks before.
Bill was the states oldest former Marine World War II, Korea and 10 other posts.
The two had deep Rhode Island roots. In a phrase that marked their whimsical spirit, they called themselves Bill and Jill of Federal Hill.
Thats where they grew up, and began an 82-year romance.
With Bill having just been placed in this hallowed ground, the family was now back to put Jill beside the only man she had ever loved.
The service for Jill took place in the cemeterys chapel, framed by a sloping field out one wall-sized window and an enclave of pines out another. A solemn reminder that the COVID-19 statistics dont tell the full story.
Its more than numbers, their son Ron, 72, said. My father and mother werent just numbers.
JOAN V. SWANN, 70, Warwick. Died April 29.
Joan Swann just couldnt leave Kent Hospital. Not even after more than 40 years as a nurse in the hospitals ICU. Instead, after retirement, she became a secretary in the same unit.
She had formed lifelong friendships there and told her daughter Glenna: I dont want to leave, thats my social life, too.
She died in that ICU in April, the first hospital staff member to die of the virus, Glenna says.
It was a sad irony, and yet offered Joans large family some comfort that she at least had people who loved her by her side when she passed.
Joan loved her family and friends fiercely, always organizing and hosting the annual Thanksgiving celebration and welcoming new people into the clan.
She loved playing Cards Against Humanity during family game night with Glenna and her three stepsisters, often doubling over in laughter.
She loved animals great and small, including the pair of cardinals that visited her window each day for years. She gave them names: Mr. and Mrs. Frankie.
Unknowingly, she also brought the virus home from the hospital. Days after she entered Kent Hospital, her companion of 35 years, Arthur J. Hewes, fell ill, too.
She would not know that he died 13 days before her.
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The pandemics human faces: Here are 1 percent of the 1,000 lives lost to the coronavirus in Rhode Island - The Providence Journal
