Roger Barbee

By Roger Barbee

He was one of the many young Americans who was part of the planned invasion force of Japan in 1945. Because of the fierce defenses shown by the Japanese on Iwo Jima and Okinawa, the  United States military leaders rightly anticipated a similar defense of the Japanese homeland. The young American soldiers assembled for the invading force stoically faced death. One of those young soldiers on the Liberty ships sailing across the Pacific Ocean, Mr. Graham, was all of 20 years old.

Mr. Graham and I met at a local restaurant shortly after  my wife and I moved to Mooresville. We had gone exploring for a good restaurant and found one that we liked. We had a good meal, and as I passed his table at which he was sharing dinner with his daughter, he reached out and asked me had I served in the military. Had I been in Vietnam? When I told him no, he apologized for bothering me, but explained that my wheelchair had caused him to think that I was perhaps a veteran. My wife continued her walk to our car, but I was struck by his manners and grace, so I stayed in the isle chatting with the dignified gentleman as his patient daughter looked on. Before I left to join my wife, we discovered that he lived at the end of our road. With that “sign” our friendship was born.

Because of his age, Mr. Graham has moved into an assisted living complex. But each week his caregiver Marilyn drives him to his house at the end of our road to check on it,  and he always stops to see me. If I am not outside in the yard or shop, he calls to inquire of my health and location. He never stays long, but his visits are packed with news, street chatter, and complaints of my religion and politics, all in good humor but loaded with a bit of salt. Over the four years during such visits, Mr. Graham and I have shared much. I know about his oil business here in Mooresville, how much he paid for his house in the early 1980’s, his religious beliefs, his four sons and one daughter, how he wishes he had been a better reader, and more. When he first told me about his wife of seventy years, Louise, a moist longing came to his eyes, and he grew silent after telling me her name. But my friendship with this 96-year-old man is also held close because he is one of the many, unnamed heroes of our country.

Mr. Graham, regretfully not a reader, probably has never heard of Wiglaf or the poem in which he demonstrates characteristics shared with Mr. Graham and his generation. In the epic poem Beowulf, the great king of that name grows old, and his kingdom is threatened by a fierce, fire-breathing dragon. He and his followers enter the lair of the dragon, but no longer the warrior he was, Beowulf suffers a mortal wound. All but one of his followers flee the lair, but Wiglaf remains to fight by his king’s side, and he slays the beast as Beowulf dies.

Because of President Truman, Mr. Graham and the other young men would not have to invade Japan. But all the other soldiers on Liberty ships along with him, willed themselves to do what was being asked.  They were prepared to invade Japan, but as is written in Beowulf, “Fate goes as Fate must” and they were spared that peril.

At an age in 1945 that today causes parents to worry if a child drives on an interstate, Mr. Graham and his generation walked into the lair of the enemy, just as did Wiglaf. Not because they wanted to, but because duty to a cause larger than they demanded it.

By Roger Barbee

The back garden pulsates with animal and plant life this colorful, fall morning: Doves bob across the ground beneath birdfeeders eating fallen seeds, some bluebirds and brown-headed nuthatches take deep drinks from a birdbath, and the cold-tolerant pansies turn to face day’s first sunburst, but the gate to the garden no longer needs to be fully closed, the “poopy bags” are no longer needed, and the screen door to the porch no longer will be scratched by an impatient paw, the abelia bush will no longer shake as it is used as a backscratcher, no longer will a set of inquiring eyes ask when the next treat will be given, the wicker chair in the library no longer will need to be kept empty in case a nap becomes necessary, no longer will the broom or vacuum be barked at as it is cleaning a floor or rug, and Mary Ann’s “brown dog coat” will no longer be needed on cold, winter nights, no longer will a beagle stand on my footrest for me to scratch her ears, and no longer will the click-click of toenails announce her walking to the kitchen to investigate what’s for supper. Callie, our 15-year-old beagle, died in Mary Ann’s lap this morning after Dr. Shivers administered the shots. Her grand heart finally failed her, and one lung filled with fluid; so like many loved animals, she was gently “put to sleep.”

Callie was Mary Ann’s first dog. She was rescued with her two brothers when they, mere puppies, were found in the middle of a busy street.  She was given to Mary Ann, but eventually, Nolan the abandoned hound and Mickey, one of Callie’s brothers, came to us. That’s quite a pack for a woman who never had had a dog before Callie– who came first and left last. But over the 15 years of life with Callie and her mates, Mary Ann discovered the joy of life with dogs. Especially hounds.

Fifteen years shared with a beagle carries many memories. As a young dog she sat under one of the hackberry trees of our Shenandoah Valley farm peering into its branches for the squirrel she had chased, and neither rain, darkness, pleads from her owners could convince her to end her vigil. Always playful, and Mary Ann and I still laugh at the memory of her pulling a ear of Nolan with her teeth in an attempt to get him to run and play. She loved company and two weeks ago she ran circles in our garden when Judy and Mike came for dinner-we like to think that was her way of being polite and welcoming. An open car door could only mean one thing and unlike other dogs, she looked out the windshield in anticipation of an adventure or things to see, no head of hers would hang out a side window seeing what was past. During her last ride to the vets, she perked up for that memory moment when she realized where she was, but her sweet head too soon drooped back onto Mary Ann’s lap. When we moved to Lake Norman four- and one-half years ago, the hounds rode with me. Of course, she sat in the passenger seat, the alert surveyor of all that was coming. While Nolan and Mickey always obeyed her commands, she never found the courage to remove any cat from her chair or bed. This past summer when we extended our garden fence, she enjoyed walking on the sidewalk to the end, sometimes looking back over her shoulder as if to clarify that her walk was permissible.

All of this and more. But physical failure demanded that our sweet Callie go. As sad as that is, we are a better couple for having shared fifteen years of life with her. Now, two days after her death, the back garden holds its abundance of life, but there is no little beagle who will walk along the sidewalk to survey the newly expanded space while glancing over her shoulder.  And the gate need not be fully closed.

By Roger Barbee

Had I not changed my mind, I would have missed it. However, because I decided to take my coffee onto the screened porch instead of going into the library and turning on my computer, I witnessed the regular recurrence that is all the same, yet different.

Light had yet to penetrate the porch or any thing else. I could make out shadows, and I saw our four cats already lounging in baskets and favorite spots on the porch floor. The abelia bush was full of blooms and bees, which I could hear but not see. Male crickets called for mates from the pine needle mulch and way off a small boat engine revealed someone likely going to a favorite fishing hole before day broke. A dove cooed from a neighbor’s thicket of pine trees while a solitary crow called its mates from our trees near the lake. Off, over the  spit of Lake Norman we call home, the first distinct sunlight lit the darkness. Waiting for the sun to clear the horizon of Stutts Road, I drank the last of my coffee and knew that I had made the right, but fortunate, decision. After all, the computer could only offer me what I already knew-the news, a few emails, or WordPerfect.

The low clouds turned colors and began to look like a horizontal rainbow, I head more birds join the dove and crow, and I could distinguish the bees from the blossoms. A cat moved and stretched in its basket. A car rumbled down our road, carrying someone to work. The day was here, and I witnessed its birth.

Enjoy it, compliments of God!

By Roger Barbee

What Air’s in Your Tires

Because we paraplegics use our arms and shoulders to propel our manual wheelchairs, the condition of our shoulders is especially important. It matters not how large our biceps may grow, if our shoulders suffer injury, we will be forced to use a battery powered chair or have someone push us anywhere we wish to go. In case the reader is not aware, battery powered chairs are expensive, and having someone push us to wherever we desire to go is not practical. Thus, when I recently developed a constant, stabbing pain in my left shoulder I was concerned.

I did what I think most folks do when a physical pain comes on—I took an inventory. I curtailed my riding of the stationary handcycle by riding less days each week and clocking less miles. I also made my workouts less strenuous. When that did not change the intensity and frequency of the pain, I strove to decrease the  amount of hard pushing of my wheelchair that I had to do. Even though our house is built on a slab, and our lot is mostly flat, I was cautious about the  ramp leading to our back porch and the ramp to my shop. I concentrated more on how I pushed my wheelchair in order to not stress my shoulders, especially the left one. Finally, the ache’s frequency and intensity did not change,  In a fashion, I just quit and, taking the convenient way out of my problem, decided that after twenty years in a wheelchair my shoulders were finally giving out from being used for what they were not designed to do.

Not long after that pathetic conclusion, I noticed that the air pressure of my wheelchair tires seemed low. While in my shop later that day, I pumped each tire to the recommended ninety pounds of pressure and went on about my business. Now, I am no Archimedes, but within a few days I noticed the pain in my left shoulder had lessened. I began my old riding regime and felt no sudden twinges when I went up the two ramps that I must use every day. While I never shouted, “Eureka”, I was, as they say, one happy camper. And paraplegic.

The 2010 van that I drive, like all contemporary vehicles, has an abundance of notifications that appear on the displays or even on a cellphone. Mine has this silly, yellow logo that appears on the speedometer’s lower left-hand corner if the pressure in any tire becomes too low. It is just one more example of, to paraphrase the slogan of one early pioneering scientific company, “Better living through….” In this case, through computers. But my wheelchair is manual and has no computer or intelligent operator it seems. Because of low tire pressure, my wheelchair required more force to move it, requiring more work from my shoulders, especially the left one. Gads, after twenty years of using a wheelchair, wouldn’t you think that I would know to check tire pressure?

My first wheelchair was black and had hard rubber tires. It took little time to realize that, while the tires would never go flat, the hard tires caused discomfort, and I despised the black. Quickly, I purchased a purple wheelchair with pneumatic tires–the color was cool and the ride comfortable. But a wheelchair is, after all, a machine and like any machine it must be maintained. But the air of the tires is so common, not complex like other parts. Air! It’s all around us and free. All life on earth depends on it, even in so simple of an invention as the  pneumatic tire.

A quick Google search reveals that the pneumatic tire was patented in the United States by Robert W. Thompson, a Scottish inventor, in 1847. (In 1849 he patented the fountain pen.) His “aerial wheels” were a hollow leather tire enclosing a rubberized fabric tube filled with air. However, because the price of rubber was so high, his inventor languished for over fifty years until a new way of manufacturing rubber lowered its price.

But never mind. The point is that because of such a simple cause, my shoulders suffered, and that sharp pain could have developed into something much more serious. And I think that our  lives are so much like the lack of  adequate air in my tires. We all need air in so many ways for our lives, but what air fills our souls? What air supports our dreams? What air refreshes our spirits? Our lives are made better when we believe in something larger than ourselves, and for me that is God. He is the air that I breathe. He is the air that keeps me afloat. He is the air that soothes my pains. He is the air that cools my burnings. He is the air in the tires of my wheelchair that allows me to push and roll easily as I traverse life.

By Roger Barbee

The cultural war is full of blather concerning how our schools teach history. In Texas, a heated discussion is on-going about a book’s treatment of one of that state’s icons, The Alamo. I remember watching the Walt Disney movie version of that battle and its heroes and villains but know now how wrong Disney’s telling was. But I remain curious about the process of our learning history whether in the classroom or during independent reading or watching a movie.

For instance, I am reading a memoir by President Carter. I am reading it because I liked the man when he was President, and, because I grew up in a small town, the sub-title of the book attracted me: “Memories of a Rural Boyhood.” The title, An Hour Before Daylight, offered me much to learn about a young boy’s life in rural Georgia during the early 20^th Century. Now, I accept that because it is his memoir, President Carter is entitled to his memory and his purpose for the book as he writes in the dedication: “To my newest grandson, Hugo, with hopes that this book might someday let him better comprehend the lives of his ancestors.” I, too, hope the book gives Hugo a window into the lives of his grandpa and other ancestors; it has certainly taught me. It has also raised questions concerning President Carter’s interpretations of events during his early life, and thus how we learn history or what we are told is historical by writers.

On page 149, President Carter writes: “ I also knew about some of the serious crimes that were committed in our region. One tragic and horrible measure of poverty in those days was the lynchings that occurred, at least partially because of growing competition even for the least desirable jobs, which in the past had been saved for black workers. As the Depression deepened, an Atlanta organization adopted the slogan ‘No Jobs for Niggers [sic]Until Every White Man Has A Job.’ The number of lynchings in America quadrupled in 1933 over the previous year, and remained equally high during the hard time that followed.”

This explanation of lynchings comes from a Naval Academy graduate who also served one term as President of the United States, so what could be wrong? Well, Carter is correct when he writes of lynchings as “tragic and horrible.” He also is correct in that the lynchings of Blacks quadrupled in 1933 as compared to 1932. But is he correct when he credits the lynching of Black citizens “partially” to the Depression and its hard times?  Hardly.

Lynchings were not a “horrible measure of poverty in those days”  as President Carter writes. Every study of every lynching shows that the “tragic and horrible” act took place when the hate filled injustice of a white majority avenged any real or perceived violation of the Jim Crow code. Any minority could be lynched, but the violence was mostly reserved for Blacks as a way of striking fear in the local population. I don’t know why President Carter writes of the history of lynching as he does, but on that page his memory collides with historical fact, and he is wrong in his interpretation of history in this example and one more that I will mention,

“Worse Than Slavery” (Parchman Farm and the Ordeal of Jim Crow Justice)  is the story of the feared prison farm in Mississippi by David Oshinsky. In his well-documented book, Oshinsky shows us an American gulag that allowed prisoners to be “hired out” to wealthy landowners to work on their plantations.  Parchman Farm would not have differed much from the chain gangs in Georgia that Carter writes of with the convicts, mostly Blacks, dressed in their horizontally stripped shirts and pants. He describes the chains used to tether the men together and he shares how he and his buddies romanticized the lives of the men they saw on the chain gangs. However, on page 61 he writes: “Georgia law permitted the chain gangs to be contracted out to private employers, so they helped with road construction, railroad maintenance, and other such jobs.” Oshinsky details the same system used in Mississippi and it is one of harsh treatment to any convict “hired out” to a private contractor. What Carter gives us is a romantic view of life on a chain gang much like that when he was young, and  I doubt that any prisoner brutalized under such a system would view his labors as helping with public works improvement.

I don’t know why President Carter would write such historically wrong interpretations. Yet he has, and that fact is dangerous because he is a respected person and his word, like the word of many well-known people, is revered. Years ago, when the brand-new alternator my mechanic friend Larry had just installed in my Jeep failed, he explained it this way:” It was made by people, and any people made thing can fail.” So can people’s view of history.

By Roger Barbee

The recent election of Senator Kamala Harris to the Vice-Presidency of the United States of America has elicited many remarks about a woman, a black woman, a child of immigrants, being elected to such a position. In her speech last night,  Madam Harris paid tribute to her mother who inspired her, and she applauded the possibilities for young girls made possible by her election.

The list of women mentioned as trailblazers for such a moment is long, and there are too many names to list here. But rest assured that it is a list of female warriors who fought for their rights and the rights of all who would follow them. They are legion.

As I watched and listened to the celebrations yesterday and the two speeches last night, I named names of all the female warriors I could remember. But one name kept returning, and I scanned a bookshelf for In Search for Our Mothers’ Gardens. The 1972 book is the first of non-fiction by Alice Walker, and I was searching in it for a particular poem that Walker introduces by these words: “This poem is not enough, but it is something, for the women who literally covered the holes in our walls with sunflowers.” She then shares her poem titled Women.

They were women then

My mama’s generation

Husky of voice—stout of

Step

With fists as well as

Hands

How they battered down

Doors

And ironed

Starched white

Shirts

How they led

Armies

Headragged generals

Across mined

Fields

Booby-trapped

Ditches

To discover books

Desks

A place for us

How they knew what we

Must know

Without knowing a page

Of it

Themselves.

Madam Harris said in her speech last night that while she is the first female to achieve the Vice-presidency, she will not be the last. The path she and all the other females is lined with the names known, but Walker’s poem reminds us that there were many “Headragged generals” who led their children across fields “To discover books” and to find “A place for us.”

So yes, let the known names be called across the land. Their work and success needs to be recognized and celebrated. However, let the battles of the unnamed be remembered as well. They, too, contributed, and Madam Harris stands on their shoulders.

By Roger Barbee

Because of some poor life choices I had made before the fall of 2005, I was working through the emotional pain my choices had left me.  I was talking with a counselor once a week, and I had a cadre of friends who supported me. My siblings proved invaluable. Having some days better than others, I decided to treat myself to a small gift to encourage my mood on October 18, 2005.

Years before that day,  a dear friend had given me a Saint Christopher’s medal that I always wore, and it was held around my neck by a wire that I had fashioned for that purpose. I now wanted a proper chain for my medal, so after school I went to a jewelry store near where I lived. It was one that I knew I could make a purchase without depleting my meager account.  

Because it had been Spirit Day at the school where I taught, I was wearing my favorite Hawaiian shirt.  I wanted and needed to continue the joy of that day, so I was eager to buy myself a small gift.  Going to the glass counter that was chocked full of rings, jewels, watches, and other items usually for sale by a jeweler, I waited my turn to be helped. A woman dressed in a green pants suit asked what I needed, and I explained that I wanted a chain for my medal. She showed me several chains. Because my key chain hanging from my neck had “Saints” printed on it, she asked if I taught at a near-by school.  I told her that I had worked there, but that I now worked at a school in D.C.

            As I looked at the chains I could afford, she asked if my medal had ever been cleaned and offered to have the store’s repairman clean it for me. Removing it from around my neck, I gave it to her and told her she could dispose of the wire that had served me for years. When she returned to the counter, I had chosen my $30 chain, and she wrote the ticket. Because we were chatting so much, she suggested we move away from the store’s cash register while my medal was being cleaned. The flirt, or spark was on! We exchanged soft information to each other that revealed but did not divulge facts too personal for a stranger.  However, forty-five minutes later my medal was clean, and the lady in the green pants suite offered to fasten it around my neck because “This chain has a difficult clasp.” I gleefully let her, and I placed the card with her phone number next to the sales receipt in my wallet. Soon after that we had dinner and talked more. She shared how that day was her deceased mother’s birthday. I shared that when I arrived home after my purchase,  I had called a sister and said, “I met a woman.”

The following July we married. We share life. We age together. All of this joy after being unable to see the beauty of many October days. But now one of my cherished gifts from Mary Ann is an antique child’s school chalkboard on which she wrote: “Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, the last of life, for which the first was made….”

I have kept the sales receipt for that chain as a reminder of what life can be. It reminds that life’s sparks are all around us, but we must be prepared to see, accept, and grasp them. And those sparks come anytime, but they are especially good in “the last of life, for which the first was made…,” when all else seemed doomed.

By Roger Barbee

This morning Mary Ann was browning several slices of meat to be added to the crock pot, in which our dinner would cook. The distinctive smell of the cooking meat caused me to recall my mother using streaked meat to flavor some of her food–  the only flavoring she could afford.

If you are not of a certain age and of a geographical area, you will not understand streaked meat. So, I will save you the trouble of Googling it and tell you that it is heavily salted pork of the same cut as bacon but cheaper than bacon. Folks in my era would fry it before eating as done with bacon or use it as a flavoring for a mess (pot) of beans or greens. My mother used it for the latter. She would send one of us to the near-by store with two quarters with instructions to get the largest piece that the money would buy. As a youngster, I always saw the white, greasy looking slab as distasteful and ugly. Sometimes a piece would have a streak of blood red meat on its edge or in the middle, but it had no appeal until Mother used it for her beans.

To flavor any food properly is an art. Any idiot, such as I, can sprinkle or pour a flavoring into a cooking pot. However, to add the best bit of salt, sugar, spice, whatever requires knowledge and experience, and Mother knew how much streaked meat to add to her pot of beans. If she did not use the entire piece, she would save what she did not need or maybe fry a few slices for herself, which was seldom because she was too busy feeding her six children.

The streaked meat may have appeared distasteful to my young palate, but the flavor it gave Mother’s beans was absolute. While I could  never understand how something so ugly and salty and fatty could help ordinary beans taste so wonderful, Mother knew how to use what she could afford to add something to such a basic dish as simple beans for her children. The beans now had some charm that appealed to my taste.

Mother never used a crock pot in those difficult days as Mary Ann is doing now. What she had to cook and to cook it in was bare, but she had the will to do with what she had. I think she must have learned that from the story of Exodus and the wandering tribe that learned to live on manna. I don’t know, but I wish I had asked her. But I didn’t, and now all I can do is remember, when I walk into our kitchen and smell browning streaked meat, Mother’s manna for her six children.

By Roger Barbee

            Many years ago I spent a few days in Cape May, N. J.  to see the historical town and its Victorian houses. One afternoon I joined a walking tour of the town and the knowledgeable guide told the history of many houses and pointed out all the details of each. I remember him telling the group the purpose of the intricate gingerbread was not only to decorate the eaves and porches, but also to cast shadows of its various shapes onto the house. Skeptical of his interpretation for the finely turned gingerbread, I took a walk-through town early the next day, and I found the treasures that he had described: Before that tour I had only seen the gingerbread of any house in one dimension, it was just a good decoration on various parts of a house, but after that morning walk on the quiet streets of Cape May I saw another reel of what I had thought I had seen many times before.

            Since that time in Cape May, I have marveled at gingerbread on houses and building. For many years I lived in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia which boasts many fine examples of gingerbread.  Now I  live on Lake Norman in North Carolina and the modern homes here have no gingerbread. But one recent morning while riding my stationary bike, I saw in the light of dawn the best gingerbread ever.

Because of the recent cloudy weather, and the earth’s tilt, the dawn I witnessed was markedly different than other ones, even on the day before. Riding the stationary bike in the shadow of our home, the sun was out of sight as it rose over Lake Norman, but its rays shown on the tall poplar tree across the road. The leafless branches of the tree held streams of dawn’s early sunlight before it moved on to lighten the shorter trees and eventually the lower trunks of the tall pines. Before too many minutes on the bike, I saw that dawn’s light highlighted the crepe myrtles in Brenda and Bill’s yard across our road. Since their row of crepe myrtles had not been crepe murdered, as observed by the Grumpy Gardner, their branches flowed skyward in a graceful reach. But I remembered the Cape May guide, so I looked at and beyond the bare branches of the trees to see their shadows on the Brenda’s house. By so doing, the dawn had another dimension.

Many dawns have I seen. Once I took a group of high school seniors on a hike in the morning dark to a rock outcrop overlooking Shrinemont, a retreat center in Virginia. Settling onto the large stone, we sat watching the dawn come, trying to locate on the forested horizon exactly where the sun would show. Time in that stillness seemed halted, but suddenly one of the students said in a hushed shout, “There it is.” We each watched until it grew too bright in the surrounding dark to directly look to, waiting for it to clear the eastern edge of that dawn. We then stood, stretched, and hurried down the trail to the dining lodge for a breakfast of fired apples, sausage, and pancakes.

In Hold Everything Dear, John Berger writes, “A mountain stays in the same place, and can almost be considered immortal, but to those who are familiar with the mountain, it never repeats itself.” Since moving to Lake Norman and taking my morning rides on the driveway, I have become familiar with our pine trees and the trees in our neighbor’s yards, the lake, our quiet road, sunrises, sunsets, and walking neighbors.   All are like Berger’s mountain.

Many dawns. Like Berger’s mountain, all are the same, but all different. Each dawn, like the gingerbread on a house or the people who live in the house, will cast a different shadow each day: The shadows of mountains, trees, lakes, people, and more will mark the day as the same, but never repetitious.

Many dawns, and each casting its own shadows and memories.

By Roger Barbee

Alex and I met when he was a 6^th grader in the all-boys’ college preparatory school in Alexandria, VA where I taught and coached. Our meeting happened during the late 1970’s, and if you were a student there, in that time, a few avenues existed in which to show excellence- academics, athletics, or both. The school required participation in athletics each season, and in the winter I coached wrestling,  Since Alex was too small and too short for basketball, he “chose” wrestling.  

Even in the 6^th grade Alex showed his mettle. He was one of those athletes that every coach loves to have on the team because he had a desire to be the best possible wrestler he could be, and his drive made him a role model, but not a role model who was a great wrestler or even one who was on the varsity squad; Alex modeled dedication in working to achieve the most that he could.  While he did win some varsity matches when a teammate was injured or could not otherwise compete in a match, his career was one on the junior varsity squad. He was too good for that role, but not good enough for the varsity. But he was always present, and his presence  demanded attention because if a teammate or opponent relaxed, Alex would attack with and either score points or win. Although he never won a varsity tournament, he won or placed high in every junior varsity tournament he entered. Too good for the one, not quite good enough for the other, but as coaches say, “a force to be reckoned with.”

Alex, now a past fifty-year-old attorney living in suburban VA, and I still communicate, and when I recently learned that his mother had died, I called him. He shared with me his mother’s final bout with kidney and heart issues and how his siblings and he were able to share precious time with her during her final days. While it is true that she was 83 when she died, her siblings had lived well into their 90’s, so her fatal illness was one for which she and her children were not fully prepared. But as she did in her life, she managed all things well and she shared time with her children. One time, when she and Alex were sharing precious minutes, she told him how pleased she was with his achievements in college, his life well lived, and the other successes he had had. He told me how she talked about his career as an attorney and “all your wrestling medals.” With that, Alex struggled before saying, “Coach, all I ever won was a few J.V. medals, but she told me how proud she was of them.” Then our talk paused until he could softly say, “I never knew that she was even aware of them that much.”

Our conversation continued as we talked about how he and his older brother were coping. We discussed the advantages of his returning to his work and office, but that the process of grieving was also important.  Sharing his grief, I offered him encouragement that seemed banal in the shadow of  his pain. Out of words, all I could offer at the end of our conversation was that he could call me anytime he felt the need to talk.

But I keep remember something Alex’s mother had said to him during one of their last talks. Facing her death, Alex’s mother looked back across the years for some comfort to give her now-grown baby child. She found what she needed: Words of praise for his accomplishments, even those as a junior varsity wrestler.