Cathy Seipp died yesterday. Her Times obituary is here. I am so sorry to see someone so young and so vital, someone with such an important (if usually incorrect) voice lose her battle with cancer.
The first thing of Cathy’s I ever read was a series of very nasty columns she wrote back in 1997 about a man I knew very well and whom I considered a dear friend, the great former L.A. Times editor Shelby Coffey III. (One such column is still online here). I was so infuriated on behalf of my friend and his family that I cursed Cathy Seipp to the high heavens, and tried to avoid reading anything else she wrote for the next few years. But her writing was too good, her views too refreshing (if still periodically infuriating). She was an important contrarian voice in the Los Angeles media world, and she will be much missed.
I note that Cathy asked for donations to the Humane Society. There’s one cause I can endorse without hesitation.
That hurts.
Cathy inadvertently got me into blogging. I was reading her Journalspace blog, and she mentioned that her daughter had finally set up her own blog, and Cathy urged her readers to go leave her daughter a supportive comment. When I tried to do that, Journalspace told me I had to register first. Minutes later, I found myself with a Journalspace blog.
She did write well. I fell off as a regular reader, obviously, but I still envied her style. She’ll be missed.
Lung cancer. On Cathy’s blog, her daughter Maia indicates that it was pet peeve of her mother that people don’t realize that you don’t have to me a smoker to get lung cancer and link to Lung Alliance.
I’ve had my share of differences with Cathy as well but no matter. I’m not sure whether to accept that she “lost” the battle with lung cancer. Given her original prognosis, it’s a miracle she made it as long as she did.
R.I.P., Cathy.
X, you’re right, talking about “losing the battle” with cancer is one of those throw-away lines that often inadvertently stigmatizes the deceased. As one who lost his dad less than a year ago to the disease, I ought to have known better.