Thursday was mostly a very bad day, especially the shouting match between myself and Jack Krier.

It wasn’t all bad. I had the wonderful conversation on Facebook messenger with Andree Dauterive Addison, one which jogged my memory and led to that post late last night. There also was another Facebook reconnection, one with a lady who was very special to me during my college days and shortly thereafter.

I first met Rebecca McCann during the 1999 LSU baseball season. She was selected as one of the Batgirls, the organization which not only retrieves bats and delivers balls to umpires during LSU baseball home games, but they also sell programs at the stadium and help out the program in many other ways behind the scenes, especially helping out around the office during the week. I knew a few of the Batgirls casually, but Becky was the first I really got to know well.

Becky was Baton Rouge born and bred. She grew up in the southeastern portion of East Baton Rouge Parish outside the Baton Rouge city limits, not too far where I lived following my graduation from LSU. She attended Bishop Sullivan, a Catholic co-educational high school in that part of EBR Parish. Sullivan opened in 1983 to serve the fast-growing population of that part of EBR and nearby Livingston Parish, as well as give students a co-educational alternative to Catholic High (boys) and St. Joseph’s Academy (girls), both of which were in Mid-City, not too far from LSU.

It was later discovered Bishop Joseph Sullivan, the school’s namesake, was part of a large sexual molestation scandal during his tenure as the Bishop of Kansas City-St. Joseph, Missouri, and in 2005, Baton Rouge Bishop Robert Muench ordered Sullivan’s name off the school. The school was renamed St. Michael the Archangel.

If you’re wondering, no Catholic diocese or archdiocese can cross state lines, so the Kansas Cities are under separate leadership. The Kansas portion of the Kansas City metro is anchor for the Archdiocese of Kansas City, Kansas,, which includes Topeka and the rest of northeast Kansas, stopping just before Manhattan.

Becky and I became good friends throughout the 1999 baseball season. She even teased me about an argument between myself and her best friend in an LSU political science class. It got so heated the distinguished professor of the class, Dr. James Bolner, had to stop it and move us to neutral corners so to speak.

Once I graduated from LSU in July 1999, Becky and I still kept in touch. I stayed in Baton Rouge and took a job with an dot-com company. Becky and I exchanged e-mails and communicated via AOL Instant Messenger, the first person I had serious chats with.

It got really serious the night of November 22, 1999.

I had a terrible day at work. After that it was just as bad, as I went to see Jimmy Ott doing his show at Pocorello’s, which was not too far from my workplace and apartment, but Jimmy was not very friendly that day. Little would I know Jimmy and I would be doing Monday shows together from Pocorello’s for three years in the not too distant future.

When I got home, I e-mailed Becky. I was desperate. I told her I wanted to end my life. She got back to me and told me she was extremely worried. She told me she called a hotline on my behalf.

Later that evening, two deputies from the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office showed up on my doorstep. They said they had a call that I was gong to take my life. I tried to tell them I wasn’t truly suicidal, but they took me in a squad car to Earl K. Long hospital clear across Baton Rouge on the wrong side of town–at least for a scared white man like myself.

As luck would have it, my dad was on working on a project for Air Products and Chemicals in Geismar, about 25 miles southeast of Baton Rouge, and he was able to drive to the hospital and pick me up. Had he not been there, I don’t know who the heck would have come to get me. Bill Franques would have been the first choice, but he was away that week on his honeymoon in San Francisco. I’m guessing the call might have gone to either Jim Schwanke or Dan Borne.

I told Becky what happened. I did not hold it against her. I’ll never forget we had a nice chat one morning at 1 a.m. after I spent a very late night at a Geismar gentleman’s club where Jimmy and I did a radio show that afternoon.

In late 2000, Becky told me she was engaged to her longtime boyfriend, Matthew Campbell. I was stunned. Looking back on it, I’m glad she found true love. She’s a very special lady.

She and Matt were married at St. Joseph’s Cathedral in Baton Rouge on April 19, 2002. Meanwhile,, I was in Columbia with the LSU baseball team as they opened a series at South Carolina.

I thought about Becky more than a few times through the years, but never dreamed we would reconnect, especially after I moved to Kansas. I am overjoyed we have.

Becky, thank you for coming back into my life. You were special to me then and are just as special now. I am elated you have enjoyed the success at Microsoft you have earned. I’m so glad you’re still married, because you deserve nothing but total bliss in your life. I will always hold you near and dear to my heart.