Summer's Here, Again. And John Clear Is Still Sick

It’s finally warm. Almost time for summer vacation, Fourth of July, all that stuff that makes people smile. The parades will go on like they usually do, whether it rains or not. The beaches will be packed, even if it’s a little cold.

Somewhere, in the middle of all that will be John Clear, a 48-year-old Point Pleasant Boro native battling kidney cancer. Only there’s no beach, no summer fun in his forecast. Instead, he’s fighting off the old demons of heroin addiction, staying clean for at least a year. He’s trying hard not to become homeless again, just trying to live to the next day.

It’s been a year, in fact, since he first arrived in New York City “with a little bit of cash and a pocket full of hope,” he wrote on his GoFundMe page. He’s got a little more cash now, and he’s got a job, even though he hasn’t been able to work much lately. He also has a wife, just getting married this past week.

But he doesn’t have the benefits to pay for his care, a diagnosis that hit him like a brick, not long after he moved to the city. He’s using GoFundMe, he says, to raise money to pay for it, even if it’s a form of begging that he never wanted to do.

It’s a life that’s so far away from what he once had, a Point Boro summer, one with a beach you could to get to by riding a bike. Now the summer is about recovery, about getting people to believe he’s for real, that he’s really sick, even if those same people are wary about ever believing in him again.

“I had decided to make a lot of positive changes in how I was living my life,” John says, referring to a year ago, when he first came to New York City. “I didn’t know my circumstances would get worse before they would get better. I found myself homeless, living on the streets of Manhattan, eating at soup kitchens and on bread lines.”

In the past 30 years, John’s become a veteran of the streets, a guy long at war with himself. So long ago, he was a Point Boro kid who once lived a middle-class life, one who surfed and partied like everybody else. He had a mop-top head of blonde hair, wore the shirts and OP shorts from the Brave New World surf shop in Point Pleasant Beach.

Even more so, he was a clown, a good one who made everybody he knew feel better. He was a funnyman who used every classroom he was ever in as his stage. He was the kind of comedian who never made it to the real stage, but was better than every comedian you ever knew.

Since he last made those people laugh, he’s had at least one stint in jail. He missed his 20th Point Pleasant Boro High School reunion because of it, an event that was held at the beach. He did have one friend who sent him a picture of it, one with the whole class standing in front of the crashing waves, with sunlight splashing over. “That helped me get through it all,” he said.

Then there were the drugs, the heroin that, he says, he finally got away from. But, even beyond he cancer, the health problems only got worse, says his wife, Cheryl. She says he’s suffering liver damage, too.

This summer, he’ll have a 30th reunion for the Point Pleasant Boro Class of ‘85. It’ll be Aug. 1, at the Clubhouse at Bay Head Shores. Another one near the beach. Once again, he may never get there; he may too busy trying to make a buck in New York City, too worried about what he’s going to do next about the cancer in his kidney.

He’s grateful for the $350 donated to his GoFundMe account. But he’s fearful, he says, because it won’t pay for all the oncologist appointments, the cost of maintaining his apartment, the medical expenses that are not covered by his insurance.

“This is a growing concern for me, as I have no immediate family to turn to. Most of the burden has fallen on my wife, until after I recover from surgery, and she is running out of resources,” he said.

“I have been told that the opposite of fear is faith. Sometimes I am riddled with fear, and the only thing that gets me through is my faith.”

When John came to New York a year ago, he was determined to succeed. He was done with being in jail, done with drugs. He just wanted a life, one he could finally be proud of, even if it was far away from what was familiar to him.

He enrolled in a “Back-to-Work” program and found a good job with the city. He was able to get a bed at a shelter, and he saved as much money as he could so he could get his own place,

Just as things were starting to look up, he noticed he wasn’t feeling like his normal self. So much so, that he went to the doctor.

That’s when he learned. Now, months later, he’s worried, even as he’s still hopeful. The money is running out, he says, so so hope is all he’s got left.

Someday, he hopes to get back to the beach.

“I believe that God hasn’t brought me this far just to leave me at this critical point in my life,” he said.

You can find John Clear’s GoFundMe page by clicking here.

The author, Tom Davis, is a lifelong friend of John Clear and a classmate from the Point Pleasant Boro High School Class of 1985.