WRITING TO THE DEAD - KEVIN

 Why write to the dead? It’s too late. You missed it. 

 Kevin McGuire and I go (went) way back…

Back to1976. Today its 2025….2025-1976 = 49 --- 49 fucking years ago! 

What The Fuck?

.I went to Penn State. Graduated in 1976… Son Tom born in 1975..I started work at Peat, Marwick, Mitchell & Co. (PMM) in Hartford around September-October 1976. I was an intern. So was Kevin. He graduated from Providence College that same year. We worked in the same office but not together. Kevin was a lot younger than I - He was like 22-23...I was 28. We hit it off early and had fun. Kevin didn’t like accounting and neither did I. However, I had to be there. Later, in 1977, I had to have an operation on my right wrist due to an accident in the Navy. I took the CPA exam with a cast on my right arm from wrist to above the elbow. I put a pencil in my cast because the CPA people said “no excuses” . You had 3 years to pass or else. So, I had a cast ony arm and it was Spring, 1977.

Kevin was a great golfer. Like in the 70s. He had been a caddie at Wampanoag Country Club where John Popp was a member. John Popp was also the Managing and Senior Partner at PMM& Co. Mr. Popp was a good man and told Kevin to apply for employment there. Kevin was hired. One day I suggested to Kevin ”Why Don’t We Start an Annual Golf Event at Wampanoag?” He said “Good Idea. Lets go talk to Mr. Popp.”

Now, young interns do not usually walk into the managing partner’s office to present a hare-brained idea like this one. John Popp was not only receptive but very supportive.

I think he said something like “Good Idea as long as it doesn’t interfere with “TAX SEASON” - We planned it for May something and it was off.

We set the whole thing up with easy support from the golf club (with John Popp’s endorsement) and got started. The event was a huge success – We used a “Shotgun Scramble” which meant that every hole had its four person team start at once. (PS – I do not nor have I ever played golf so I had no fucking idea what that meant.)

We started and Kevin and I took a golf cart full of beer and drove around passing out the beer. Me in my cast and everyone wanting Kevin to join their foursome.

I am not sure if the “Annual” part continued or not. Kevin left the firm to sell for CIGNA and I left to become a CFO for a small exporter.

Kevin and I kept in touch for years and stayed friends. He was a great golfer but an even greater golf pro/coach. He came by our house in Chester, Connecticut one time and after a few beers (Kevin always drank MILLER LITE) we went outside. Our property was on Chester Creek in Chester, Connecticut and was across the street from the creek.

“Kevin, see that billboard over there? (it must have been 200-250 yards away)

See if you can hit it!”

Kevin laughed good-naturedly as always and said. “Ok, I’ll try”

He lined up the shot and took a swing. I swear to you the ball soared out over the marsh grass, between two tall trees across the street and rose up two times or levels and BANG hit the billboard!. We ran back into the house laughing and hiding from anyone who may have seen us.

Years passed. Many years when I knew Kevin had worked long, travelling hours for CIGNA, gotten married, adopted two kids, and then got divorced. We touched base and then I got the call. Kevin was in the hospital in Hartford with cancer. I drove there and walked into his room. 7-8 guys were sitting around, some from Providence College, others, neighbors, friends, golfing buddies from Duxbury or Marshfield. They joked as if Kevin was just in for a check up. He encouraged them with more jokes and teased then with golf stories. Later, maybe six months later, Kevin called me. “Hey Tom, I am at Legal Seafoods near the Aquarium didn’t you say you were working near here? Come over for a beer.”

I joined him and his lady-friend at the bar. Kevin looked like shit. He was as upbeat as ever “Pure Kevin”. “Hey Tom! How are you?”

Kevin proceeded to tell/assure me that everything was going great. He said he had the best oncologist in Boston and that everything was great. “How are YOU doing, Hows Nelle?”. Looking at Kevin, knowing him and how he was so upbeat all the time was very disturbing. I left, we hugged, and the next time I saw him was at a Hospice Unit somewhere in Scituate. He died a few weeks later.

I remembered him telling me “Tom, I plan to retire soon, before I am 60, and play golf every day” Kevin was 59 when he died.

WRITING TO THE DEAD - BIG RED

 Why write to the dead? It’s too late. You missed it.

Saying “Thank You. I love you. “ is too late.

 I have a piece old wood clapboard hanging on the wall near the back door of my parents-in-law’s house. It says”

“RED! Hot coffee + hot stove 

Come up when you get up! 

Love – Tom.”

Red was my father in law and he was way better than my “real” father. I loved him dearly and worshiped him and everything about him. When he got dementia // alzheimizer’s disease I lost him. I tried to “snap him out of it” by saying things like “You know Red, you remember, right?”

It didn’t work. Now he is dead. As a decorated US Marine, VA Togus Hospice took him in and gave him a respectful, peaceful passing. I thank God I was there to hear his last, rattled, raspy breath.

Now, many years later, I am fortunate to go into his house in Maine, right next to ours, and say:

“RED! Where are you? Coffee is ready and the wood stove is hot. Come up when you get up!”

But, all is quiet. Red is gone. Now I am writing to him any way.

Love,

Tom

The Lost Poem...Poetry Lost

 

One time I wrote a poem

It wasn’t very good.

I left it in a drawer

To age like seasoned wood.

I thought about that poem

It took awhile to write.

But I Ieft it in the drawer

I will look for it tonight.

I forgot to check the drawer

A friend came by for wine.

I will check on it tomorrow

Tomorrow should be fine.

A week went by, then another two

I think I will read it tonight

I left it in an old dresser

In the barn where I can write.

The night was cold, the barn was dark

The dresser wasn’t there.

I doubt that it had disappeared or

Vanished in thin air.

I looked around in panic

The poem grew better with time.

But I still could not find the dresser

I had lost my greatest rhyme!

I knew it was a masterpiece!

How could I have let it go?

Written with #2 Ticonderoga

I t was gone for good, I know.

I always keep the original

Each one a precious thing to save.

No matter how or where I wrote it

So I can take them to my grave.

I can write another one

But it will never be the same

As the one I left in the drawer that day

It could have brought me fame!

F. Thomas Crowley, Jr

RUNNING AWAY

 All my life I have been running away.  As if i would be caught or have to face or tell the truth

my vivid imagination gave me places to go or hide. Out the window, down the road, hitchhiking, to the islands.

All this was fine until I got married.  I married a person so much better than I and a family, too.

Yet, I was still running away.  Unforgivable escapes;

• Sailing School for whole weeks at a time, leaving my young, beautiful pre-bride at home in a small apartment, 1971, St Petersburg
• Running away together was fine because Nelle was with me.  She should have always been with me, She wanted to but I just ran away,
• Even while working - it was always the traveling - accounting became consulting - more travel overnight for days, working in South Carolina, weeks while Nelle stayed home, alone.
• Fearing the bad influence i might be on my children - excuse to keep running away.  Letting Nelle do all the work and parenting...alone,
• New Orleans --- the longest escape imaginable, Unbelievably selfish dreamer hiding

WHY is she still here?  I have almost destroyed the young love we had by abuse

If God can help me I will try it again.  Confession, Absolution, Recovery, healing, begging for forgiveness

Stopping those things that divide us.  We only have 10 more years.  I have wasted 40.

STRETCH

 Bored and barefoot on the hot sandy beach she said “Did you ever play STRETCH as a kid?’

“Sure, all the time. We played it barefoot on the grass at the local park. Different styles for each player. Some liked to make you stretch as far as possible within a knife length maximum, others liked to throw the knife close to your foot to scare you. Surprised no one got stabbed. You?”

“Yes, in Mississippi we played it on the soft grass behind my grandmothers house. In Connecticut we played it on the beach.. I was the best knife thrower”

“Me too. Wanna play?”

They played stretch for almost two hours with his old Ka Bar rigging knife She won every time as he would fall over, ending the game.

“See? I told you I was great!”

They laughed and collapsed on the hot sand. It was September 1971. They would be married in November and sail away to the US Virgin Islands in December. They wouldn’t play stretch again for 50 years.

July, 2024, Lincolnville Beach, Maine. He was 76 and felt older than he looked. She was 74 and still looked fantastic.

“Wanna Play Stretch?” she asked.

“What? With our knees? Can we do it sitting in chairs?”

“No! That’s cheating. We do it like we used to on the beach. Come on!”.

They held hands and walked down to the water’s edge on the south beach where the sand was deep even if it was mostly seaweed covered. They used a steak knife and she won easily as his left knee gave out after a few lame moves and he fell over.

That night they reflected back on their lives together. “Stretch” seemed like the perfect metaphor for all they had been through; sailing in Maine, Florida, the US and British Virgin Islands, The Bahamas, and Guadaloupe on large old wooden and steel schooners and bareboat chartering on new fiberglass slops and catamarans. Restoring old houses in Connecticut (three), Massachusetts (one on National Register) Maine (two), South Carolina (one) and newer used houses in Florida (three houses) and Mississippi. Struggling without money through college and the early years. Endurng hurricanes, floods, and a bridge loan to buy an old house with no plumbing or electricity that took 16 years to restore. Yes, STRETCH was a good word for them. The stretching was over but the memories remain clear and comforting as they now had six grandchildren to watch over and wonder; Maybe they all will need a little more STRETCH in their lives?

Why Do We Wait?

 

Why Do We Wait?

Why do we wait? To say:

• Thank you,

• I’m sorry,

• I was thinking about you,

• I miss you,

• I love you,

To write a poem or finish a book.

We may be sitting at a table or desk in the morning

drinking our coffee or tea

and think about someone who we remember

or liked or loved or who helped us through a bad time

or who we worry about.

But we do nothing

Thinking it doesn’t matter or its too late.

I wrote this poem about my wife, 23 YEARS AGO.:

The Red Dress

Maybe it takes years to get it right.

Maybe you never do, but you try

And in trying, you succeed a little

And then she dies.

And it’s too late for anything but

The Red Dress.

This was the dress that she wore one night.

She picked it out for you, but she had some doubts;

Would you like it? Was she too old?

Too fat?

When she came down the stairs,

You got excited like you always did

When you saw her body, which

She kept well hidden.

Modesty borne of Southern aunts

And a classic Southern Grandmother

From Northern Mississippi,

Who did not think a lady

should be seen in a red dress, ever.

You loved that red dress,

And she looked great in it,

After 25 years of marriage,

You still got excited when you saw here.

But you didn’t say anything that night,

And then the night was over.

Dinner was great,

you had red wine.

You talked about the kids, the house,

But you never mentioned the red dress.

That night, she took it off and you made love.

She put the dress away in the back of the closet.

That’s where you found it when she died.

The kids are coming home for the funeral

And your daughter will agree

With your unspoken regrets.

So tomorrow you will bury her in it.

and for the rest of your life you will remember

That sometimes it’s too late for anything

But The Red Dress.

F. Thomas Crowley, Jr.

Written on the AMTRAK train from

Old Saybrook, CT to Boston. - April 25, 2001

reviewed – ok - September 27, 2024

Thankfully, I read it to her and she laughed and

agreed with me - It’s never too late

unless someone you meant to call – dies.

The Maine House - for Red & Martha - 2013

 It is not fair

That you are not here

I talk to the walls

As if you will appear.

The stove is off,

Nothings burning.

I miss the smoke

Pyromaniac’s yearning.

The yard is quiet

Red’s not whacking

Far too quiet,

Something is lacking.

No greeting as I arrive

Martha is gone

But the old Maine house

Is still alive.

Alive and waiting

For you all to appear

To lift a glass

And shed a tear.

They loved  "you all"

And held you dear

They missed you both

When you weren’t here.

The Maine House waits

For the family now

Red and Martha’s family

As fate will allow.

We will all come back

To the house we love

As Red and Martha smile

Happy at peace up above.

We will tell the stories

From our different views

Each of us victims

of The Maine House, Our muse.

Tom – written first on July 28,2013

re-written – September 12, 2024

still true.