If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

It’s been over a week now. I’m still fuzzy-headed, cloudy, unfocused.

Think I’ll go hit some golf balls to break outta my funk…

Last Wednesday morning, a little after 8 a.m. Eastern, he took his last breath.

For over fifty years, he got up at 5:30 in the morning. Never complained once.

Same routine.

Shave, cup of tea, bowl of Bran Flakes, brush teeth. Out the door and off to work.

For weekend fun,(and to escape the mind-numbing routine and stress of the work week) he loved fishing and boating on the Delaware Bay and Atlantic. Chasing bluefish.

The guy could build and fix anything. Built a modest, solid brick house , high on a hill, in a sleepy little village in Lancaster County where he was born, raised, and spent his entire life.

He finally retired seven years ago.

A weak heart kept him from his fishing and boating.

We all thought he’d keep busy woodworking.

Didn’t happen.

For some reason, he lost interest. Somehow couldn’t focus?

Two Octobers ago, he saw a dog and a duck in the front yard of his home.

He shouted to his wife of 55 years…

“Come look, a dog and a duck! Right outside in the yard!”

She looked. And looked.

No dog. No duck.

“I think I need to go see a Doctor.”

He never returned to the home he built high on the hill.

His neurologist called it Lewy Bodie Dementia. It’s kinda like Alzheimer’s. Protein deposits form on parts of the brain. It effects everything. Walking, talking, eating, memory. It’s tough to say how long he was suffering. And, even tougher to say how long he’d last.

After 20 months of daily routines over which he had no control and that he didn’t remember, he caught a cold and couldn’t fight it off.

As my friend Rick Reilly wrote in his ESPN debut piece, for better or worse, my Dad shaped me. My Dad was quiet, a man of few words. Yet, he was always there. Loyal. To my Mom, to his family, to his community, his employer, his country.

Loyality seems so rare today. Loyality is a long-term play. It’s a 57 year marriage. It’s working for two employers your entire career. It’s going off to the Army when you’re drafted.

My Dad had zero pretense. You always knew where you stood with him, even though he spoke few words.

Loyality and being true to yourself. Dad never said a word about either of ‘em to me. He simply lived ‘em.

Thanks Dad. You’ve taught me lots.

Popularity: 9% [?]