SEPTEMBER 9TH

It’s always a special day since 1991. Before that time it was special and filled with laughter, but today, after 23 years it is a quiet and sad special day. When he left us, he had a smile on his lips, and a mischievous way about him that said: “I made your life what it is.” He always made me laugh, even when he gave me the hardest of tasks, even when he said NO to me, or didn’t have the success that I needed to get on with my life.

The greatest gift he gave me was his sense of humor, it was always there, I was loyal to him, very loyal, to the point that someone once insulted him and I was ready to fight! But he was a peaceful man, big hearted and caring, he did so much for people that a good portion of his life was about others.

He was my dad, worked 5 to 6 days a week, hard, and expected me to have that kind of constitution. He was impressed by education, something he had very little of, considering the circumstances, he did OK for himself, and I got his education, and he was proud.

He was a constant source of fun and amusement, always finding trouble without looking for it, was a master at teasing my mother and lived to tell about it. Once as a young teenager, laying in front of the big Magnavox TV caught in a very scary movie, my world shut off as I focused at the screen, my breath held, he reached out over my head and said: “BOO!” Scared the living life right out of me. I laughed so hard my sides hurt.

Once when he was smoking he needed to add fluid to his lighter, and somehow dropped everything on the floor, and suddenly I could hear stomping upstairs, like a dance and the curiosity of knowing he was up there, got me to investigate. He had dropped the lighter and the fluid on my mom’s new living room rug, the rug was on fire and Dad was stomping out the flames. Dear old Dad!

Once we went crabbing off a pier in Patchogue, and Dad had his technique. As the sun was setting we stood at the edge of the pier, a net attached to a long pole, and a flashlight to attract the crabs, and as the crab followed the light to the net, we had crabs, a simple operation that Dad understood. Then suddenly, a large crab surfaced and Dad got real excited, leaning over the edge in his excitement. Suddenly he saw the crab and started going: “OOH, OOH, OOH!” and leaned too far, right into the drink!

Dad loved a good salad after dinner, he made sure we all had some and then ate the rest of the salad bowl, his favorite part of his dinner. It had to be the last thing we ate, that salad.

Today is his birthday, his first birthday spent with Mom together once again since June 12, 1991, the day he passed. I wonder what that will be like, maybe they will have a quiet salad together, then Dad will take the remote and as Mom falls asleep, will change the channels, maybe he will watch the Mets, after all, the way they are playing, they may be dead already.