Whipped Cream Difficulties

Ian Fishback. He was 42.

Major Fishback was one of three former members of the 82nd Airborne who said soldiers in their battalion had systematically abused prisoners by assaulting them, exposing them to extreme temperatures, stacking them in human pyramids and depriving them of sleep to compel them to reveal intelligence — or, in some cases, simply to amuse the soldiers. He said his complaints were ignored by his superiors for 17 months.

I wanted to note this because the circumstances seem particularly sad to me:

His family said in a statement that the cause had not been determined. He died in an adult foster care facility, the climax to a distinguished but abbreviated career that the family said had begun to unravel as a result of neurological damage or post-traumatic stress disorder resulting from combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was admitted to the facility following court-ordered treatment with anti-psychotic drugs after he had become delusional and created public disturbances, his family said.

I’m reminded of a story I read several years ago about a young Green Beret who had a distinguished service record. Until he started going downhill: showing up late, not showing up at all, other issues which ultimately led to him being dishonorably discharged from the Army. He kept going downhill, was eventually institutionalized, and finally died. After his death, it was determined that he had Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (possibly picked up from eating sheep brains and eyeballs in the field with indigenous personnel). His family petitioned to have his discharge upgraded to honorable, and I believe they were eventually successful.

Peter Buck, co-founder of Subway.

Margo Guryan. I’d never heard of her, but this is another one of those stories with a hook. She was a talented musician and songwriter who, in 1968, released an album called “Take a Picture”. The album tanked, in large part because she wouldn’t tour…

Yet somehow decades later, with the digital age facilitating both word of mouth and the sharing of music, adventurous listeners discovered it — first in Japan, then in Europe, and finally in the United States, where in 2000 Franklin Castle Recordings rereleased it, followed the next year by “25 Demos,” a collection of other recordings of hers. Ms. Guryan, who by then was in her 60s and had settled into an anonymous career teaching music, had an unexpected burst of something resembling fame.
“It’s still amazing to me to have something resurface after 30 years,” she told The Los Angeles Times in 2002. “People say I’ve been rediscovered. It’s not true — I’ve been discovered.”

NYT obit for Malikah Shabazz.

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