Jeff's Memorial New Year Walk

Anna, my wife, called me early this morning to keep me posted on her mission to Erie, Pennsylvania to see her nephew Jeff Tomczak before he died of pancreatic cancer. She said the priest had been called and had administered Last Rites at 5 A.M., the third time in five days. She asked if I could come for the funeral, although nobody knew when. I said I would book the airline and call her back.

I paced around the house aimlessly, washed the dishes and laundry, then decided to take my dog Zinnia for a walk around Lake Helen, a walk that has solved many uncertainties and calmed many fears before.

My mind went to Jeff, whose illness had brought him home to his family. When I saw him near Erie, two and a half years ago, he gave me the strong hearty handshake of a forty-year old as he stood shirtless in blue jeans holding a heavy construction compressor air-nailer cocked to his side like he was Sylvester Stalone in a Rambo flick. Helping several of his five brothers and one sister build a house for his brother Bruce and sister in law Cheryl on his father's farmland, he said "I'm working like hell for two weeks, then returning to my cabin in the mountains of Colorado, where the air is clear and there's no one around me, except Spike, my dog."

Strong in his opinions, independent and sometimes remote, Jeff was shy when you first met him. Knew how to build things--the right way. Argued with his family at times, particularly his father, Dave. Would never admit that his father was why he knew how to build things that last.

His shirt was your shirt if he felt you really needed it.

Reminds me of a few guys around Lake Helen.

I turned onto Lakeview and headed by the lake on Barbe. I stood in salute to the shimmering waters of Lake Helen under a pale cobalt blue sky. I passed Rich's roses on my left, some still vibrant red as though defying the frost from the night before. I passed the green canoes of the Inn by the Lake, beckoning for passengers. Up the hill and on past the house rehab on my right. Is a craftsman like Jeff there? No. All is silent. A day off because it's Sunday.

As I turn onto Orange Avenue, I smell fragrant citrus groves and pungently aromatic wood fires from chimneys on Enchantment Lane. What other city has "truth in advertising" in their street signs like this?

Facing south into the dappled noon sun filtered through Spanish moss draped across live oak arms, my eyes water up. I cry for Jeff, and yes I cry for myself. Zinnia looks up at me and says, "I know".

Suddenly, the cell-phone ring breaks my teary isolation. Anna tells me that Jeff died around eleven, being held in his mother Gerry's arms like the Pieta of Michelangelo, turning white as Carrara marble, a smile on his face, a release from months of pain.

I look out onto Lake Helen where a stocky bearded man in a bass boat stands casting his line slowly as the fisherman St. Peter while Anna tells me how stark the black hearse looked against the white winter snowdrifts as it turned onto the country road towards the funeral home in Erie.

Rounding the south end of Lake Helen I scanned the broad savanna of the rolling pastureland and wetlands around Lake Harlan, recently filled with winter rains. Cattle grazed nearby as sand hill cranes honked and some ducks and anhingas traded diving techniques. Wide open spaces where the air is clear.

Shuffling along in my absent-minded way, I encountered blood-red poinsettias lunging at me from a porch at the turn. I escaped across the road and stomped under the maple tree in the circle of leaves, now brown and crinkled up under the tree.

Anna told me just before boarding the plane to leave, that she had called Rev. Nick Sourant in Cassadaga for advice on talking to Jeff. He had said "Just tell him he doesn't need to hold on any longer, to not be afraid because on the other side is warmth and sunlight and beauty and health."

Ascending the concrete platform in Royal Park, I moved my shaking hands over the recently completed railing project of Craig Caldwell, who had worked to acquire his "volunteer community service" merits toward his Eagle Scout Award. To the side of the railing in a monumental rock sculpture is a bronze plaque dedicating the park in 1988 by the Jaycees and volunteers to Erston Royal for "38 years of public service to the citizens of Lake Helen". I thought of Craig, now young and full of promise, I thought of Erston, now gone but forever respected, I thought of Jeff, just now gone, and I thought of myself, just here.

From the Royal Park platform, the lake looked like a lopsided good-luck horseshoe.

Across the street, a brick mason was tap-tapping a chimney onto the exterior of a house. Could it be Jeff? I moved on quietly up Michigan Avenue to Euclid.

On Euclid, a recurring pattern of red ribbons, red poinsettias, blue skies and white picket fences and siding collected into the American flag in the churchyard on the corner.

At Blake Memorial Church, the wood log Nativity manager was empty with bundles of frostbitten green palm fronds thrown to the side. I thought of the Rock at the Tomb being rolled aside and everyone had gone to Salvation. Mary and Joseph with Baby Jesus had led the Wise Men down the dirt sideroad to walk along Harlan Avenue under the long tunnel canopy of tree limbs into the western sun. Following after them were Lake Helen citizens Erston, Michael, Larry, Flora, Max, Jimmy, Tommy Lee, Mary and a whole troupe I didn't know as well. I trailed after them at a distance, led on by soft breezes and the early afternoon sun.

At the corner of Harlan and High, I came out from under the orange grove and tree limb canopy into the glare of the asphalt street. My leading troupe had gone on without me.

As I turned, a young woman came down the street pushing a baby stroller, with the youngster inside cheerfully singing rhymes to his mother. After waving to my dog, the child returned to its chanting, the mother smiled a soft gentle smile and pushed on as I laughed.

Yes, indeed, Jeff has passed on to sunlight and health as we all shall someday.

Welcome, Lake Helen to 2003, our young child in the stroller.