I will not be preparing a special 9/11 Post. For me, it’s not necessary. I wrote one last year, and the fact is that I carry the memory of that day with me every day. I suspect that most people do, particularly those of us who lived close to the carnage.

I did not spend this day attending any 9/11 ceremonies. Rather, I spent today attending the funeral of my brother-in-law, Ted, whom I have known and lived in the same town with for the past 34 or so years. He had been suffering from multiple medical problems for the past several months, and the problems cumulated and became, at the end, impossible to treat.

To the world, he was a regular guy, who worked hard for years until he was able to retire. During the Korean War he was drafted, and, like millions of others before and since, he showed up and did his duty honorably. However, while he may have been a regular guy to the world at large, he was a very special guy to his family. He leaves behind his wife, two grown daughters, a son and a brand new daughter-in-law (he made it to the wedding a month ago), all of whom loved him very much, and he loved them back. They did him proud.

His other love was baseball. He regularly attended local baseball games, and it didn’t matter whether the players were seven or seventeen. He just loved the game. He was particularly blessed when his son excelled at baseball in high school and college. I don’t believe that he missed any of those games. Later when his son became a college baseball coach, you could always find Ted at the game, giving “pointers” to his son and to the players.

He would have been pleased to know that his son’s college baseball team showed up at the wake with a signed baseball and a team jersey emblazoned with the number “1.”

I wish him an eternity of good weather, close games and a comfortable seat behind home plate.

Teresa: “Dan Rather is on the phone. He wants to talk to you.”

John:

Teresa: “Don’t pretend you can’t hear me. You’ve been in this goddamned bathroom for more than two hours. Come out of there and answer the phone.”

John: “Can you take a message?”

Teresa: “No, I can’t take a goddamned message. He said he wants to talk to you now.”

John: “Oh, God. What does he want?”

Teresa: “What does he want? What the hell do you think he wants? His exact words were, ‘I want to talk to that son-of-a bitch about those fucking documents his guys sent over here’.”

John: Tell him I’m windsurfing.”