Doing It for the Sport

It’s been a while. Nearly a year since I stopped in and almost a year and a half since I wrote anything. I never wanted to leave, but the last two years forced my attention in other directions.

Two years and four days ago I didn’t see my father for my birthday. My mother told me he wasn’t feeling well, which was odd because he was very rarely sick, especially sick enough to not see me on my birthday.

A few days later we found out why he wasn’t feeling good. He had bile duct cancer. They gave him 3 to 8 months.

Jim “Mad Dog” Mandich found out he had the same type of cancer at around the same time. It was surreal listening to him on radio going through the same thing I saw my dad go through every day.

At that time I was working in downtown Miami right down the street from the American Airlines Arena, where the Miami Heat play. Working on the 20^th something floor looking over the water of Biscayne Bay was a beautiful view and helped take my mind off what was going on. It’s too bad the Issac Daniels Group didn’t have a good view on anything. They laid me off as they didn’t want to pursue a sports website anymore and wanted to focus on a technology based product, which never panned out.

That caused me to take a break from writing. I still had announcing for the FAU Owls soccer and baseball teams, which I still do, so that kept me in media. I got to spend more time with my father for a month or two which was nice, although I’ll never feel I spent enough time with him.

I ended up getting a job with an inspection company, Don Meyler Inspections, and I’m still there now. Although it’s different work from my field, I make four to five times what I made with the Issac Daniels Group, so it isn’t all bad.

But bad turned to worse for my father. He fought hard and lived past the time the doctor’s gave him (about a year and a half), but about a week before his 56^th birthday it was best for him to be in the care of a local hospice.

The day we found out that my father was being transferred to a hospice my fiance and I found out that she was pregnant. And yes it's my child, right honey? (I have to throw some humor in here.)

When I got to the hospital the night they were transferring my dad to the local hospice he was about passed out. My mom was there (I already told her) along with my uncle and a couple friends. When I told my dad the news he sat up and smiled. I’ll never forget that.

My dad died at that hospice April 4, 2011, on his 56^th birthday.

It’s almost been six months since that day already. It feels like just yesterday he was showing me the correct way to shoot a basketball and how I need to square up with the rim.

I think I speak for everyone that was close with my father when I say, and I’ll use a triple negative here,… Although I may not show it on the outside it isn’t easy not having him around. He was a positive influence on everyone around him every day of his life.

Even though I’m not getting paid for writing at the moment I think my father would want, hell he does want me to keep writing. Like he always taught me, do it for the sport.

So I’m going to write for the sport. This blog got me my last paid writing job, so I’m sure it will happen again. Turning 26 four days ago and being about two months away from fatherhood has jump started my engine.

By the way, if this was too much information for you I could care less. I felt I had to get this off my chest and explain the gap between blogs before I jumped back into writing.