In spite of the snow and wind that heralded the first day of the winter season, on Monday, I wasn’t disappointed to see an end to the autumn of 2008.
In addition to all the ills that last fall bestowed upon us – principally an oncoming recession – these past months have delivered a series of emotional setbacks my family won’t soon forget. That’s why an e-mail from a friend in Saskatoon seemed yet another blow.
“I have sorrowful news about a feisty newsman,” Dennis Fisher wrote.
The note went on to explain that Jim Mattern – that feisty newsman, with whom I had worked in the 1970s at a Saskatoon radio station – had suffered what appeared to be a debilitating stroke. What was worse, according to Fisher, the e-mail writer, it had happened while Jim and his wife Gail were on a winter holiday in Puerto Rico. Mattern was in a coma. Medical authorities apparently had decided he should be kept in hospital there, indefinitely.
“I don’t know what we can do,” Fisher signed off.
As often occurs when critical information remains at arm’s length, in the days that followed, we received conflicting reports – from the family, some of whom had rushed to the Caribbean island to be with Jim, and other reports through well-intentioned friends. We learned that the attack had come on suddenly, that some medical officials had recommended brain surgery right away, and that Mattern was on a respirator, which seemed to indicate the worst – he couldn’t breathe on his own.
Added to the medical problems, were the logistical ones. Medical insurers in Canada were at odds about whether Mattern could be airlifted home. And even if they sorted that out, there was some question whether airborne cabin pressure mightn’t do more damage than good en route home.
“Our feisty friend will have lots to talk about when he recovers,” wrote Dennis Fisher in another e-mail. “I only hope he does.”
These days of waiting for word naturally unleashed a flood of memories from the times I remembered working with that “feisty friend” 30 years ago now. Jim Mattern and I both worked the early morning shift at CFQC Radio in Saskatoon – I as on-air interviewer, he as morning news reporter.
I don’t think anybody loved news gathering, writing or broadcasting more than Mattern. It didn’t matter whether it was the high stakes world of Saskatchewan agri-business, the provocative nature of provincial and municipal politics or just the latest stories from Saskatoon’s crime beat. Mattern treated every shift as if the world depended on his getting the news, and getting it right.
But Jim Mattern loved practical jokes too. On one occasion, when roasting the station’s long-time morning news anchor, Mattern took his cue from the man and began reporting on the apparent drunken and disorderly conduct of that same news anchor the night before. The man was horrified this apparently defamatory story was going live over the station’s airwaves. It wasn’t. Mattern had arranged for a perfectly harmless news report to actually be aired simultaneously.
It was perhaps the best “gotcha” in broadcasting I’d ever witnessed.
More important to Jim Mattern, however, was the thoroughness and accuracy of his real reporting. Anybody who had anything to do with news at that station – either the radio or TV side – checked with Mattern to be sure. His take on news was ever reliable. I remember, years afterward, when the international Radio and Television News Directors Association recognized him for lifetime achievement, it called him one of those “pure newspeople.”
As discouraging as the reports from Puerto Rico about Jim Mattern’s well-being seemed last week, there suddenly appeared one positive sign. We’d heard from a family member, by week’s end, that he was off the respirator and breathing on his own. Even better, though he was still in a coma-like state, when his wife asked him to squeeze her hand, he did.
Meanwhile, my e-mailing friend had discovered via Facebook that the insurers had stopped bickering over the possible flight home. It was beginning to look as if they might arrange the airlift after all. Then, Sunday morning brought another e-mail.
“Mattern’s coming home!” was all it said.
Then later that day, more messages arrived and even a cluster of e-mailed photographs of the jet on a frigid Saskatoon tarmac and of the sign welcoming Jim and his wife home. What had just days before seemed another personal disaster, had reversed. My friend Jim Mattern’s return home seemed to me a “Christmas Carol” turnaround.
With some hope restored, I look to better days for my friend – and for all.