Marathon victim discharged, says he’s now ‘a better person’
BOSTON – Pete DiMartino dreamed of summer ale from his Boston hospital room, a kind of light-bodied beer with honey and lavender accents he might pour in the brewery he wants to open someday.
In quiet times between therapy sessions, the 28-year-old bartender from Rochester, N.Y., even came up with a name for the future business: Hip Zipper Lodge.
It’s a defiant nod to the trauma that brought DiMartino to Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, the April 15 bombing that embedded the pull tab of a zipper near his left hip, blew away much of the back of his right leg and burned a lot of his left leg.
One moment, DiMartino was watching for his mother to run by as she headed for the Boston Marathon’s finish line. Then the first of two bombs detonated about 20 feet away and he was down on the sidewalk, with some people screaming, others running away, and blood spilling.
He used his weeks of hospitalization to reflect on what his life will look like going forward. DiMartino, who also does masonry work, has been reading up on becoming an entrepreneur and formulating the beginnings of a business plan.
“I just want to show that it’s not all bad, that there is positive that can come out of it. I appreciate life more now,” he said from a wheelchair at Spaulding last week. DiMartino rejoices every day in what he calls small victories, like making it a little farther on his crutches and climbing a few stairs for the first time.
“I don’t want anybody feeling sorry for me,” he said. “I want people to see that this has made me a better person, and I want people to become better people through what they see through me.”
DiMartino had three surgeries at Massachusetts General Hospital, including one operation to take tissue from his left arm and skin from his right thigh and to rebuild the back of his lower right leg. He was discharged from Spaulding on Thursday.
His 26-year-old girlfriend spent weeks recovering at another Boston hospital after suffering injuries in the blast that DiMartino said also injured her 5-year-old son. DiMartino’s 31-year-old sister, Gina, left Spaulding about three weeks ago after suffering a shrapnel injury that also left her having to learn how to walk again.
DiMartino will be sharing a bedroom with her as the two recuperate in their parents’ home in Webster, N.Y.
He joked that he’d been in Boston so long – he’d gotten visits from Celtics and New England Patriots players and threw out the first pitch at a Red Sox game – that he felt like a local.