Hospices to honor Great Neck man's humor

Howard Shapiro always managed to find something to laugh about.

It wasn't easy. Growing up secretly gay in Great Neck in the 1970s was a challenge, said his sister, Leslie Greenberg. In 1991, he was diagnosed with HIV and, she said, promptly fired from his job in publishing. He died five years later at 40.

"When he was diagnosed, instead of throwing the covers over his face, he got right out there and started making fun," said Greenberg, of Atlantic Beach and Manhattan. "He could turn something around and make it funny."

"He made light of the fact that he was dying," she said of her brother, who wrote a series of columns in several New York publications about his struggle with the illness.

In his memory, Greenberg and her husband, Joel, decided to work with MJHS -- a health-care agency formerly known as the Metropolitan Jewish Health System -- to help raise $16.8 million to open two hospices in New York City. The couple is donating Shapiro's extensive collection of celebrity memorabilia -- which he amassed when he was too sick to go out and spent time writing humorous letters to about a thousand stars - and spearheading fundraising efforts for the two hospices, in the Bronx and Brooklyn. They hope the facilities, which will display Shapiro's collection, can also incorporate some of his spirit of fun.

The organization plans to open hospice residences in the Bronx and in Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, each with 16 units. The Brooklyn facility will have 16 one-bedroom, diamond-shaped suites, with space for patients as well as their visitors or families, all with ocean views, and there are plans to dedicate a wing to Shapiro. MJHS officials say they believe these will be the first hospices in the city to accept children.

Pediatrics "is a particularly emotionally difficult area to work with, and the training is more complex, and the emotional challenges involved with a family are overwhelming," said David Nussbaum, MJHS' executive director.

Howard Shapiro's legacy fit perfectly with their mission, Nussbaum said.

" Make no mistake about it. These are not eulogies," he said of the collection. "In a strange sense . . . brings a certain sense of normalcy to people's lives who have been turned upside down."

Shapiro, who didn't reveal he was gay until after he was diagnosed, began writing a monthly column for the Body Positive, a now-defunct magazine. Calling himself "Kvetch" (Yiddish for complainer) he told jokes, imagined outrageous scenarios, and described his worsening health with dry wit. ("I've become so weak that I ask a neighbor of mine to carry a lettuce leaf from the refrigerator to the salad bowl.")

He wrote about everything from his sister spraying Lysol before she walked into his Manhattan apartment, to an imagined conversation with an angel about whether heaven has TV Guide and pizza.

He wrote letters to celebrities on yellow-lined paper (To Roseanne Barr (Arnold), he wrote, "I'm a Jewish Kvetch with HIV, but it could be worse. At least I'm not living with Tom Arnold.") He was thrilled and amazed to receive more than 500 responses, ranging from letters to signed headshots, which the Greenbergs cataloged and kept.

"I've been in possession of his collection, and I've been trying to find a home for it. I wanted it to be an inspiration for people going through terminal illness," Leslie Greenberg said. "I contacted several people, and MJHS understood."