FUN FIRST!

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•  Guess not.  One more Cub fan in heaven made no difference.  Sorry Pop.  Baseball is like life:  being the best last week doesn't make you the best right now.  Baseball is about pitch-by-pitch execution.  So is life.  It's what you do with the current moment that counts.  I want to take this moment to thank everyone for extending their condolences and prayers for me and my family.  It's very uplifting to have so many people offer support in our grief.  It definitely makes a difference.  Thanks.
•  "I have fought the good fight.  I have finished the race.  I have kept the faith."  These words of St. Paul come to mind in considering the death of my father.  As we bury his body today, we will see the physical representation of a life being completed.  A fight involves many punches being thrown and a race many steps.  The end depends on how each punch was thrown or each step taken.  Dad's good steps far outnumbered his bad ones and his mortal life came to a victorious end.  It was a life lived in Christ.  My dad threw himself into anything he took an interest in.  Once he took an interest in Christ, he became a Biblical scholar.  But, he was still an Irish plumber so his learning was applied in a typically blunt manner.  If you wanted a straight answer, he was your guy.  Today is the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, a humble man who loved God completely.  I'm sure dad would be honored to be buried on his feast.  St. Francis is also associated with loving animals which brought to mind something that sums my dad up pretty well.  He always made a show of hating cats.  One day, my little sister found a stray which was the ugliest cat anyone had ever seen.  This cat must have lived its whole life in the streets.  My dad, while steadfastly maintaining his disdain for cats, built it a house, up off the ground, so it could safely live next to our house and my sister till the end of its days.  My dad may or may not have hated cats but he loved my sister and that was all that really mattered in the end.  Thanks dad.  See you later.  In your blue sweater. 
•  I look a lot like my dad.  When I walked into his hospital room a few days before he died, the nurse said "You must be his son. You look exactly like him."  I laughed and thought "Thanks so much for saying I look exactly like an 87-year old dying man!!"  But, it's true.  I do.  The visitation is tonight and there will be a bunch of people who bear some resemblance to him wandering around.  People of different ages and dispositions but at least a passing resemblance that shows a family connection.  There will also be a lot of people with no physical resemblance but who have a connection in spirit to him, or me, or my siblings.  There will be the usual "I'm sorry for your loss" and "I can't believe how your kids have grown," etc.  But what gets said doesn't really matter.  It's that spiritual connection.  The friendship.  The thing that motivates a person to show up even though they know they can't say anything to make it better.  The unspoken "I know this hurts and it hurts me that it hurts you and I know that you know that it hurts me that it hurts you and that's why I'm here so you can see that it hurts me that it hurts you and you know that I love you because otherwise I'd get as far away from all this hurting as I could."  Friendship is one of the truly great things about being human.  But, if you do want to say something to cheer me up at the visitation say to my brother "You must be Mark's older brother." He is older but people usually can't tell and that definitely does not cheer me up!!

MONDAY, OCTOBER 6

 "I'm stuffed.  My friend made turkey and mashed potatoes and everything last night.  It was like Thanksgiving-- without the dysfunctional family."  I overheard this statement this morning.  It got a good laugh out of me.  Got to thinking that it might be a good idea for people who are stressed by having to spend holidays with families that don't get along so well to declare spontaneous holidays they can celebrate pleasantly.  What's to prevent you from proclaming tomorrow a real Thanksgiving Day and celebrating it with people of your own choosing, in a place of your own choosing, in a manner of your own choosing?  Give it some thought.  Even if your family isn't dysfunctional, tossing in a few extra Thanksgiving Days would be fun anyway and its always good to have an excuse to overeat even if there's no football or parades with giant inflatable Snoopys on TV.