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GREENSBORO — Count the swallows on Tim LaFollette’s left forearm.

There are 23, all different sizes, flying from his wrist to his elbow. It’s from a sticker on a Quaker song book his mother used, a design he had tattooed on his arm to remember the woman he barely knew.

Karen Keller LaFollette had ALS. Tim has it, too. He found out in May. And he’s only 30.

Tim’s mom died when he was 2. He doesn’t remember much. Yet, he knows a genetic link made him prone to get a disease that could eventually rob his body of his voice, his movement, his very breath.

Tim has started to see that happen. He can’t work anymore. And he can’t walk well. He needs a cane or a walker because his right leg operates, in his words, like a “floppy crutch.’’

He knows it’ll get worse. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is a death-sentence of a disease. So, he’s getting prepared.

He’s learning to operate a motorized wheelchair, and he’s planning to record his voice saying requests, commands and the names of friends so he can blink his eye onto a machine and communicate.

As he often tells his friends, “I’m not going to die unhappy.’’

So, he spends time with his girlfriend, Kaylan Szafranski, and plays bass in his new band, Decoration Ghost. And if he topples to the floor, with a beer in his hand, you can expect him to say, “Well, at least I didn’t spill.’’

Tim wants to live as he always has — wide open to the world.

He’s the only son of a philosophy professor. A Guilford College grad, he’s the guy who ambled across campus barefooted as a freshman, with a safety pin in his right eyebrow, wearing a cow suit with udders on his belly.

He ran WQFS, Guilford’s eclectic radio station. He graduated with a degree in history and traveled nationwide in a van with Kudzu Wish, one of Greensboro’s most popular bands. He became a filmmaker, shot band videos at the old Ace’s Basement and worked as chief video editor for a local video production company whose short film got shown at the Cannes Film Festival last year.

And now, Tim has ALS. And an army. The Often Awesome Army. They’re at least 600 people strong, and they’re doing what feels as natural as breathing to their generation — using social media to create, connect and shout loud in cyberspace.

It’s alien to what so many other ALS patients do. At least the ones Tim and his girlfriend see. They run into patients, usually twice their age, and hear them say, “You tell everyone, and you have a Web site?’’

Yes, they do. Their friends are a creative bunch. They’ve created a design, sold T-shirts, scheduled benefits, researched government assistance, built a Web site, offered art for donations and shouted onstage like a carnival barker hard at work.

“This is for Tim!’’ an emcee yelled a few weeks back during a benefit show at The Blind Tiger. “Things are worth saving, and Tim is definitely worth saving. So give! Give! Give!’’

So far, Often Awesome has raised $6,000. On Friday at the Green Bean, the group will hold a silent art auction with all the proceeds going to help Szafranski when she becomes Tim’s primary caregiver.

Tim has health insurance. He also has Medicaid. But ALS is expensive. The one drug that slows it down costs $1,100 a month. And when Tim’s body eventually stops — no one knows when — Szafranski will need some help.

Like an SUV equipped with a swing-out front seat and a lift in the back for Tim. She and Tim have a name for it. The ALSUV.

Seems pretty appropriate. Particularly for Tim.

He’ll be waiting to see his doctor at Duke ALS Clinic and say for anyone to hear, “I’m dying for some of you to see me!’’

He’ll be thinking about the epitaph for his tombstone and say: “I would love to have that on my tombstone. Often Awesome.’’ The name stuck.

He’ll be talking to Szafranski about death when their conversation slips into talk about “Ghost,’’ the 1990 film about a husband, his ghost and a medium played by Whoopi Goldberg.

“If you die, you need to find out how to pull off this 'Ghost’ thing,’’ Szafranski has told Tim. “You need to find your Whoopi Goldberg.’’

Then there’s the other side of Tim.

He called his friends with the bad news, told his girlfriend, “Let’s start fighting’’ and stood in front of a big crowd and recited the speech given 70 years ago by ALS’s first famous casualty, baseball legend Lou Gehrig.

Tim did it on July Fourth at Durham Bulls Athletic Park. Without notes. “There’s a small chance I could make it out of this,’’ he says. “I probably won’t, but I want to do what I can to get the word out.’’

In mid-November, Tim and his friend, filmmaker Andy Coon, will unveil a Web site that’ll become an informational portal for ALS patients. Tim will do three- to five-minute videos to help ALS patients deal with the disease.

Meanwhile, there’s talk about turning Often Awesome into a nonprofit geared to help people in their 20s and 30s handle the emotional and financial roller coaster of terminal illness.

Tim knows that roller coaster well. But he’s riding it with an army of friends, some of whom have their own dovetail swallow tattooed on their shoulders, wrists and forearms, in various shapes and sizes.

It’s for Tim. And like Gehrig, Tim knows he’s lucky.

“You get to experience and see things other people don’t see,’’ he says. “Just a lot of good. And the amount of love and care. There’s way more good in the world than bad. That’s something people really have to believe.”

Contact Jeri Rowe at 373-7374 or jeri.rowe@news-record.com