LATHER. RINSE. REPEAT.

As a kid I used to read anything and everything at our house that had writing in, on, or around it.

Even shampoo bottles.
I always found it unusual that every shampoo bottle I ever saw at home included the directions;
Lather. Rinse. Repeat. 

Who needs directions for shampooing their hair?  Isn’t that something most people do everyday?

And, as long as I’m questioning the directions, Repeat?
Really?  I’ve always found one lather and rinse to be adequate.

I mention this mundane task that is part of most adult’s daily routine for a good reason.  We’ll come back to it later.

At work a small group of us have formed a book club.  We meet periodically to discuss the books we select as well as work issues and current affairs.  At one of our gatherings the point was raised that the characters in our books typically lead remarkable lives, or have been influenced by profound events.

In Wally Lamb’s, The Hour I First Believed, the main character is an English teacher at Columbine high school in Littleton, Colorado.  He is greatly affected by the school shooting.

Hanna Schmitz is an illiterate former Nazi guard at the Auschwitz concentration camp in Bernhard Schlink’s, The Reader.

Cheryl Strayed wrote about her 1,100 mile solo hike in her book, Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail.

Those are just a few of the books we’ve read with remarkable characters and notable circumstances.  None of our books have had characters or circumstances as hum-drum or ordinary as me and the life I lead.   Oscar Wilde stated, “Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative.”  My days are so consistently identical, one just like the last, that there appears no imagination nor anything out of the ordinary whatsoever.

I didn’t perform the remarkable feat of playing sports in college, but my children and friends of mine did, as I stood on the sidelines and watched.

I didn’t give birth to children that developed into remarkable adults, but I was smart enough to marry a woman who could and did.
 

I haven’t done any groundbreaking research, discovered a cure for any disease, or solved any pressing social issues, but I do the invoicing and reporting for grants awarded to professors at the UofM that are doing those things.

Socrates said that, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”  So I was thinking that maybe I should indulge in some introspection regarding this.  You know, examine my life a little bit.

NAH!

I found my answer in a most unusual place from a most unusual source; 
In the nursery of my nine month old granddaughter Ayla.

My Lovely Bride and I were with Ayla 24 hours a day for 6 days recently at the house she shares with her moms in Boston.  We loved spending time with them visiting and relaxing as they went about their lives.

Little did I know that our visit would be so educational for me.

Ayla delights in playing with her books and simple toys (wooden blocks, rattles, stacking toys, and balls designed for children to grasp).  None of her toys whir, buzz, or light up, they are all pretty ordinary.  Ayla can play for hours on end with these simple toys.  Each time a new play session begins she is delighted all over again to be able to play with those same familiar toys.

 
Granted, her moms give her new toys and take her to new and exciting places.  Ayla loves those too.  But, if those new stimuli were unavailable it appears that she would be happy just the same.  She finds satisfaction in the unremarkable, she entertains herself, she explores with enthusiasm the world that’s been created for her.

Is it just childhood enthusiasm on her behalf? Or, is it maybe a really good way to lead one’s life?

I don’t have the biggest house in the neighborhood, but it’s nice and comfortable.
I’m OK with that.

My job is fairly routine month in and month out, but I’ve learned to appreciate the stability it offers.
I’m OK with that.

I can’t skate as far or as fast as I used to, but I’ve come to accept that just being out and exercising is a good thing.
I’m OK with that.

What gives my life its richness is time spent with friends and family. 
The changes of the season. 
A good skate or bike ride. 
A good book.
A good meal. 
Working with stained glass and writing every now and again.

Like Ayla I am able to find satisfaction in the unremarkable, mundane, everyday routines like lather, rinse, repeat.

And I’m OK with that too.

I’m supposed to be answering questions for my granddaughter.
Instead she is answering the big questions for me.
Who knew? 

  

THE CHAPTER IS WRITTEN BUT THE BOOK IS NOT FINISHED

“THE CHAPTER IS WRITTEN BUT THE BOOK IS NOT FINISHED.”

Simon Schama, 
Historian and Narrator, The Story of the Jews

Coincidence: A remarkable concurrence of events or
circumstances without apparent causal connection.

Coincidences are, by definition, quite remarkable and
sometimes hard to explain.  

I rather
enjoy a good coincidence.

Here is my most recent one.



As a student at the University of Minnesota and later as a fulltime employee I
worked with various varsity teams, predominantly the Golden Gopher football
team. A colleague on the equipment staff was a man named Jack Johnson.  Jack worked with many non-revenue sports and
developed a fast friendship with the women’s track and cross-country coach,
Gary Wilson.



Years after I left the Athletic Department Jack developed cancer and the true
glory of friendship was shown by Coach Wilson and his wife Susie.  They accepted Jack into their hearts and their
home, taking care of him like family because Jack had none left to care for him in his final months.

 

Jack passed away from cancer well before his
time.

Prior to Jack’s passing Coach Wilson also dedicated one of the track team’s
indoor meets to him naming it “Jack’s Run”. I don’t often read the short
articles about the non-revenue sports in the Minnesota Daily campus newspaper,
but I seem to catch the ones about Jack’s Run each year.  It makes me smile to think that this
colleague, who left no direct survivors, is still remembered, and his life
celebrated, in this simple way even if the remembrance is felt largely only on
campus by a few, for a short time each year.



The moving eulogy at Jack’s funeral was not Coach Wilson’s last noble act on
Jack’s behalf.  A donation was made to
the Athletic Department by Coach Wilson and Susie to name the visiting locker room at TCF
Bank Stadium the Jack Johnson/Dick Mattson Locker Room.

Dick Mattson, Todd Stroessner, Brett Bresnahan

Dick (Matts) Mattson, the other namesake for the locker room, is very much
alive and kicking. He has retired after working his entire career in U of M
equipment rooms predominantly with football. 
He is keeping busy golfing, playing bingo, growing tomatoes, and traveling south in the fall with his son Keith to visit Matts’ old Southeastern
Conference friends and to watch football where it is not just a game, but a way
of life.

Sunset over Lake Superior

Recognizing that Matts and I are probably in the twilight of our years, and partially as a
tribute to Matts’ wife Lu who passed away two years ago we have been gathering
with equipment staff, players, and support staff each of the last two years at
J.D. Hoyts to watch a Gopher football game, eat great food, tell tall tales of
past glories, and just generally celebrate our friendship.

Harry Broadfoot, Todd Stroessner, John Blackshear

Jim Kimlinger, Todd Stroessner

We're meeting tomorrow to watch the football Gophers battle with Michigan for the Little Brown Jug.

Minnesota maroon and gold

As I skated my five mile course tonight, enjoying nature’s maroons and golds it
occurred to me that perhaps when we gather tomorrow a memorial of some sort
ought to be made to Lu Mattson, Jack Johnson, Bonnie Olein (another equipment
staff colleague claimed by cancer too early) and any others we have lost since
we all worked together.

A prayer?

No, I’m not eloquent enough, nor do I have the composure to lead a prayer to
fallen friends.



A moment of silence?

That might just be awkward.



Maybe I should just let it slide.  As I
skated on I decided, LET IT SLIDE.

Then Coincidence occurred. 

Or was it providence?



On the trails one sees all manner of dress on runners, walkers, skaters, and
bikers.  Notable on most occasions are
far too many Wisconsin Badger shirts.  I
just don’t get it. If you like Wisconsin so much, why aren’t you there instead
of here in the Gopher State?  I’ll never
figure that out, but it is what it is I guess.

Tonight, within about a minute of deciding not to attempt a
memorial at tomorrow’s gathering, I saw something I have NEVER seen on the
trail.  

Heading straight at me was a young couple pushing a stroller as they walked.

That’s hardly unusual. 

The part I had never seen before, on the trail, or anywhere else, was the
maroon shirt on the young mother with the gold letters on front, “JACK’S RUN”.   



After sailing past them the words sunk into my brain, JACK’S RUN.
 


JACK’S RUN.


It was either the weirdest coincidence ever or providence telling me I had to
do SOMETHING.

I doubled back, approached the couple and introduced myself
as a friend of Jack’s and, at the risk of being weird explained what I was
thinking just prior to encountering them. 
I found out that she had run for the U on Coach Wilson’s track team and
that she remembered Jack well. After speaking to them and meeting their 2 week
old baby it became clear to me what I could do.



A toast to our departed colleagues!

Over the course of our time working together we all drank
together on many occasions.  Even though
a few of us are recovering alcoholics Pat at Hoyt’s always supplies us with
both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages. 
I think it’ll work.

 

 

 

 

Pat Montague, Todd Stroessner

Upon arriving home I began to think of those who have gone before and those yet
to come.  The title quote for this piece really
struck me when I first heard it.  I think
it will most likely be the basis for the toast I propose tomorrow.  (Thank you Don Waldman, my machatunim, for recommending
the PBS Series, The Story of The Jews.)

Upon first hearing that quote I thought it might be a fitting eulogy theme I’d
like used upon my passing. For when my chapter is written the book of my life
will continue with my survivors, my wife, kids, and grandchild(ren).





For Matts and his wife their book will continue with their son Keith, his wife
and their future children.



For Jack Johnson and Bonnie Olein their books continue with those of us whose
lives they touched.



For all of us we are continuations of books with many chapters written by our departed
parents, grandparents and other ancestors. And that book continues through all who we touch as well.  



Life is a never ending story.

Who knew?    

WE GO TO THE WOODS

We go to the woods, my family and me;

To relax and renew at a much slower pace.

For the woods offer solace and silence and calm;

Things that are missed in the normal daily race.

The woods show us life in its unending arc;

Birth, growth, and maturity, to its last dying spark.

Tiny cedar saplings neighbor towering pines that soar;

And gloriously hued maple shade birch sprawled across the forest floor.

Birth leads to death,

Leads to birth,

Leads to life…

The old always granting life to the new.

We go to the woods my family and I;

To pay tribute to those gone before us,

And those yet to come,

To stop, look, and cherish, as life passes by.