AFTER all the debilitat ing seizures, after the 11 brain operations across his 15 courageous years, Matthew Von Dollen looked down from his suite to a Garden standing and cheering for him. He waved, and his friend Mark Messier waved along with him. This was his dream, this was his wish, to meet Messier, everyone’s Captain Courageous, and the Garden of Dreams and the Make-A-Wish Foundation had scored the goal.
“Messier’s holding him so tight,” the boy’s mother, Kathy, said at the MSG Training Center in Greenburgh as she flipped through the scrapbook of this unforgettable night Nov. 5.
“So I won’t fall,” Matthew Von Dollen said, and laughed his frequent laugh.
On Christmas Day, it is a good idea to celebrate one of the warmest, sweetest stories of a year that has given us Tim Donaghy, Michael Vick, Adam “Pacman” Jones, Barry Bonds and the Mitchell Report.
“People were screaming!” Matthew said.
The mission at Garden of Dreams is to help children in crisis – children with life-threatening illnesses, impoverished children, foster care kids, victims of abuse.
“Sports celebrity wishes are not uncommon,” said Thomas Conklin of Make-A-Wish Hudson Valley, “but this is the first time we’ve had Messier as a specific wish for our chapter.”
Too often a prisoner of his condition, Matthew has watched tapes of Messier winning the Stanley Cup over and over. Christine Burton, the Garden’s director of community relations, met with Matthew in August.
“I just remember how he just kept talking about Messier like he was his friend,” she said.
Matthew and his parents and siblings left their hotel room wearing their Von Dollen No. 11 jerseys. They were greeted by a Garden marquee that blared, “Matthew: Welcome to Your Wish Day.” Messier and a wide-eyed Matthew embraced hours before the Ranger game in the tunnel outside the locker room. Matthew interviewed Messier in the MSG studios.
“He asked me about my favorite player; what it was like winning the Stanley Cup; what it was like playing with Wayne Gretzky,” Messier said by telephone. In Messier’s eyes, he was the one meeting Captain Courageous. “I’ve met a lot of kids like Matthew in different circumstances. It’s just always incredibly inspiring to see the attitude not only the children have and the courage they show, but also the parents.”
When Matthew returned to Clarkstown South HS in Blauvelt, he was besieged by autograph seekers. He won’t dare wear his new Messier jersey there.
“It’s autographed,” Matthew said.
They come out of the woodwork to share the power of the wish, because the Garden of Dreams includes the Knicks, Rangers and Liberty, the MSG Network, Fox Sports Network, Radio City and the Rockettes, and the Fuse National Movie Channel.
In the lunchroom at the MSG Training Center, Avery stopped by and was informed that Matthew wears his No. 16 in his hockey league. Avery draped an autographed jersey over Matthew and said, “Well now he wears my last name too.”
A thrilled Matthew smiled and said, “Thanks, Avery!”
*
Soon, Burton was driving to the Maria Fareri Children’s Hospital, where five Knicks – Jamal Crawford, Malik Rose, Eddy Curry, David Lee and Nate Robinson – passed out toys and games and little Knick bears and autographed cards and posed for photographs with bedridden patients. A young girl named Selise smiled as she showed off her T-shirt that read: “If you’re cute, I’m single.”
Lee broke everyone up when he said, “Oh, that doesn’t apply to any of us. If we see somebody, we’ll let you know.”
The Knicks took turns wheeling a little red wagon filled with gifts around the floor.
“There’s bigger things in life than wins and losses,” Crawford said.
“It’s heartwrenching . . . you see these kids . . . none of ’em asked to be here,” Rose said. “They’re hurting and there’s no way you can help them, like physically. The parents are beat up ’cause they deal with it 24 hours a day, not being able to help their children. We come in and we put a little smile on their face.”
“I think it really makes their day, it makes their holiday season,” Lee said. “Also it’s rewarding for us to just go spread a little holiday cheer and help some kids that are in need.”
*
It has been two years since Matthew’s last brain operation. “Why me?” is something they’ve never heard from him.
“He’s in the hospital a lot, so he sees other kids much worse than him,” Kathy Von Dollen said, “and I think he really takes that into account.”
She remembered something the boy whose cup is always half-full told Messier during the best night of his life: “If it wasn’t for the seizures, I would have never met you.”