A Tribute to Sammy

This entry will probably make little sense to many, but for the group of people I shared time with last week, it will hopefully be very clear what I am talking about.

After hearing from people who knew Sammy all their lives and most of his, I would like to give my perspective, of someone who just got to know him in the last year of his life.

I know some have said that in recent months, under the burden of progressing illness, Sammy was not the person they always knew. This man was feeble and uncertain of himself. The Sammy they describe to me was a take-charge kind of guy. Well, I can tell you that to me, beyond the infirmities time imposed on him, that person was still there.

Therese, Sammy's daughter, and I started dating in January of 2010, and I met Sammy and his wife Eileen for the first time in September of 2010. They came to New York City to visit for a couple of days before boarding a cruise ship to Canada. Then, on the back end of their cruise, we spent another couple days visiting in New York before they got on a plane back to Florida.

We had a wonderful time. And near the end of our time together, when Eileen lamented that this might be their last vacation, Therese proposed (and I heartily agreed) that the four of us do a cruise the following September. And in the ensuing months, we have been planning out that trip, a cruise to the Mediterranean that Therese, Eileen and I go on starting a week from now.

Now I want to clear up something - and this is really the central point of this tribute. Anyone who thinks that the work of planning this trip, and accommodating Sammy's infirmities for this trip, has been some kind of labor or burden, or that we have made some kind of sacrifice in including him in the trip, is wrong. They don't know the real story. So let me tell you that story now as best I can.

In getting to know and love Therese, I have from the beginning felt so special because of the openness and generosity she has demonstrated to me, in welcoming me into her life and her home. I supposed that she learned to treat people in such a loving way from her parents. This suspicion on my part has been confirmed in the last week, when all the members of Sammy's family welcomed me with equally open arms. I may be a recent addition to the family, but in true loving fashion, I was treated on equal terms as everyone else.

So having been treated so well, with such loving care, I can only hope to demonstrate the same qualities myself, to give back what I have received. Planning our trip has been so much fun. The anticipation, as we have been counting down the days until we were to leave, has been delicious. Unfortunately, Sammy didn't hang on long enough to enjoy the trip with us. But he got tantalizingly close!

And the experience of sharing Sammy's last days, and taking part in caring for him, and then putting together his memorial service, is something I will never forget. My grief at his passing must be miniscule to what Therese and Eileen and Joan and all the cousins and friends are feeling. But I know that none of us can have any regret about not doing all we could to make Sammy's transition from this life to what is to come as smooth as possible. We did, as Therese kept reminding us, an incredible job. The pangs of pain at losing this man who meant so much to us will continue to come. His suffering has ended; we still are here to pick up the pieces of our lives and go on.

The memory that I will always carry with me is spending last Christmas with Sam and Eileen, along with Therese and her daughter Valentina and Valentina's boyfriend Jake, in Naples, Florida, at Sam and Eileen's home. There is a photo from that visit of Sammy, Jake and I smoking cigars on Sammy's porch on Christmas morning. Sammy looks very happy. He was very happy. I was very happy too.