What's essential? In France: pastry, wine. In US: golf, guns

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Pedri announces Luzerne County COVID-19 crisis committee

This was supposed to be such a magical time of year, especially for a sports family like the McGrane family.
				Dani McGrane, a senior at Wilkes-Barre Area, was looking forward to competing in the first track and field meet for the city&rsquo;s new sports merger.
				Rosie McGrane is nearing the end of her freshman year as a student at Bloomsburg University.
				Kylee McGrane, who just moved into a new apartment in Manhattan, was looking forward to the upcoming fundraisers that finance her nonprofit company that helps brings smiles to sick children.
				They were all coached in track and field by their dad, Wyoming Valley Hall of Famer Paul McGrane, who was so much looking forward to opening the high school track and field season this past week as the new coach at Wilkes-Barre Area after a lifetime coaching Coughlin and Meyers.
				That&rsquo;s all put on hold now.
				This new coronavirus crushed everyone&rsquo;s plans.
				High schools and colleges closed all over the country. People are sheltering at home all over the world. From youth leagues to pros, the sports world has pretty much shut down.
				So there are no good games to divert us from the news of a bad virus that keeps spreading so rapidly across the globe by the day.
				&ldquo;I hope,&rdquo; Paul McGrane said, &ldquo;there&rsquo;s not a coach saying, &lsquo;Get your guys and keep working out.&rsquo; This is too serious to be practicing.&rdquo;
				All practices stopped, as sports is hardly a priority for anyone right now.
				Just getting back to a normal life after weeks of social distancing and sheltering is the starting goal.
				Because COVID-19, a respiratory illness for which there is still no alleviation or cure, is claiming lives by the thousands. And it&rsquo;s not just a story concerning some other continent anymore.
				It&rsquo;s ravaging this country, this state, this county.
				Nobody has been hit harder than New York, where they are setting up makeshift morgues and where more than 25,000 coronavirus cases have been reported in the city.
				&ldquo;My daughter&rsquo;s in New York,&rdquo; Paul McGrane said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m scared to death for her.&rdquo;
				That would be Kylee McGrane, a former District 2 medalist in swimming and track and field when she was competing for Meyers and Coughlin.
				She is now the CEO of A Moment of Magic, an organization in its fifth year that has volunteers dress up in costumes and visit hospitals in hopes of bringing a bit of joy to those who are very sick, many of them terminally.
				When the New York Yankees got word about what she was doing a few years ago, they asked her to throw out a first pitch at Yankee Stadium, and since then, Kylee McGrane has returned to the Wyoming Valley to organize races that help keep those moments of magic happening for the kids.
				And right now, she is relegated to spending a lot more time with her boyfriend in their new 35th Street apartment than either of them figured on.
				&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve been quarantined for the last 12 days,&rdquo; Kylee McGrane said. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think it&rsquo;s fear. But I think the numbers out there are something we have to be very aware of.&rdquo;
				She said it&rsquo;s not so bad for people in New York who are smart about it and follow the advice and directions of state officials.
				&ldquo;There were a bunch of people out in the parks, I&rsquo;m not so sure that&rsquo;s such a good idea,&rdquo; Kylee McGrane said. &ldquo;But the amount of traffic we&rsquo;ve seen has really dwindled. The last time I was out was about a week ago, went to the grocery store, and a lot of grocery stores are limiting the amount of people who can go in at one time. The rest have to stay outside, six feet apart. But once you get in, all the shelves were stocked, you could get what you need, and getting checked out was no problem.
				&ldquo;Everyone I saw was very patient and understanding of the situation.&rdquo;
				Patient people? In New York?
				&ldquo;Our big joke in our household is, New York people aren&rsquo;t rude, just loud,&rdquo; Kylee McGrane laughed, before turning serious. &ldquo;My friends who are nurses know the gravity of this situation. I think it&rsquo;s really challenging. One thing that has been &mdash; I wouldn&rsquo;t say comforting, (but) it helps &mdash; is knowing we&rsquo;re not in this alone. This is not just affecting me, but affecting people all over the world.&rdquo;
				Like a lot of us, the coronavirus pandemic may have stopped routines, but not determination or spirit.
				Instead of making hospital visits, she just had to find new ways to light up the lives of sick kids.
				&ldquo;We are staying positive about that,&rdquo; Kylee McGrane said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve recently gone to virtual visits &mdash; private, 30-minute calls to children individually. We&rsquo;ve trying to be creative and continue our support of them. The hardest thing for me is, we can&rsquo;t go home. I have to stay put, I can&rsquo;t see my family.&rdquo;
				Back in Wilkes-Barre, her family could use some emotional support.
				Rosie McGrane can&rsquo;t return to finish her first year studying at Bloomsburg.
				&ldquo;She came home for spring break,&rdquo; Paul McGrane said, &ldquo;and they told her to stay home. I feel terrible for her.&rdquo;
				Depending on how long the coronavirus lingers, Dani McGrane may not get that 16th sports letter she had her heart set on, and may not get to have a senior prom.
				&ldquo;She has 15 (letters) now,&rdquo; Paul McGrane said, rattling off a list of Dani&rsquo;s accomplishments in swimming, indoor track and field and outdoor track and field. &ldquo;She wanted to be a 16-time letter-winner. She might not have that chance, and that&rsquo;s the one thing that would really disappoint her.&rdquo;
				Paul McGrane&rsquo;s heart would sink if his track and field team didn&rsquo;t get a chance to compete.
				&ldquo;We really were looking forward to this first year, with the addition of GAR and Meyers,&rdquo; said Paul McGrane, who guided Coughlin&rsquo;s track and field team for more than the past decade. &ldquo;A kid like Rafael (McCoy), he&rsquo;s on the cusp of getting state medals (as a sprinter), I saw him a couple weeks ago when this (shutdown) happened, he was kind of in a daze. My daughter (Dani) is waiting on getting into college. It&rsquo;s really hard right now.&rdquo;
				These are a few difficulties one sports family from the Wyoming Valley is dealing with. There are many more stories with even more serious concerns out there.
				Which is why Paul McGrane is imploring people to stick together in isolation rather than risk losing even more ground to COVID-19.
				&ldquo;We&rsquo;re going to do whatever our governor says,&rdquo; Paul McGrane said. &ldquo;Everything&rsquo;s coming from that direction. We&rsquo;re just hoping everybody listens. Our top priority is the safety of our kids. Anything that would jeopardize that, it&rsquo;s not worth a life.
				&ldquo;It&rsquo;s not worth one life.&rdquo;

Sokoloski: While life and sports shut down for McGranes, the spirit doesn’t