This tribute was more than remembering a truly loving, caring, thoughtful friend. Your tribute spoke to me directly as I am sure everyone who read it. It is so important to keep connected to friends both new and old. We are shaped, molded, inspired and taught by those we connect with throughout our lives. It is so very important to keep those bonds in place, your piece reminded me of that.

You write beautifully and thoughtfully, you always have. I express myself in song (or getting arrested at a protest). I will be going back into the studio in a few weeks to record a very special song. This past summer I lost a very close friend of fifty-two years. We knew each other in Saint Bernadette grade school, outside of Philadelphia. In May, I was on a golfing trip with him and seven others that I have known all these years. We are all brothers. Two weeks after our trip, he had a terrible head ache that turned out to be a minor stroke. He went to the hospital, the stroke was the least of his problems. He had stage four lung cancer that had metastasized to his neck and jaw. Mike died six weeks later. At his funeral his wife took me by the arms, looked me in the eye and said, “Pat, write a song for Michael”. I have never written a song on request and mumbled and bumbled when she asked me.

Wakes and Funerals are for the living, we get distracted seeing old friends and telling stories about the friend that has just passed and often forget why we have gathered. On the drive back to Boston from Philly as I drove up the Jersey Turnpike I was mourning my friend of so many years. As tears ran down my cheeks I began writing. I called his wife Laurie as soon as I got home and asked her if she was sitting down. I sang my song for Michael to her over the phone. I then asked her if she wanted me to send her the words. She said “no”, she wanted to hear them and she wanted the hear me singing them. So in a couple of weeks we will be back in the studio. I want to have it for her for Christmas.

Here is chorus of the song, I am sure you can relate.

Today I lost a friend of mine, a friend of many years
Today I cry and feel the pain and wipe away the tears
Tomorrow as I think of you, will raise my mug of beer
Remembering the good times, laughter and good cheer.

Thank you my friend,
Pat

If you don’t mind, I’d love to share this with others on some of our social networks – it’s a touching piece that I think many at Merrimack would relate to and appreciate.