Goodbye Johnny Stef

I learned this morning that my dear friend Johnny Stef passed away last Thursday. John was my favorite person (by far) in my five person learning team at business school and my friendship with him was one of the best things I got out of going to business school. After scouring airline websites and thinking creatively about childcare options, I am sad to say I don't think I will be able to make it to his memorial service on Tuesday in New York city. But just because I can't be there doesn't mean I can't spend some time remembering my good buddy Stef.

John was one of the most decent and big-hearted human beings I have known. What I mean by decent is that he was someone who was more honest than most of us and didn't shy away from difficult conversations or doing the right thing even if it was uncomfortable or hard. He took good care of people and he went out of his way to help people, but in a quiet way that made it clear that he was doing it for them, not for himself. He was "hip" in the best sense of the word: always impeccably and boldly dressed, always knew what was going on and had a knowledgeable and thoughtful take on it. And he was quirky too: ask him what he is reading and he is as likely to say The Peloponnesian War as The New Yorker.

I have fond memories of spending time with John during business school. Beyond the many group projects our learning team worked on, we spent more than a few nights out in Philly with classmates and friends drinking and dancing until late (the song Magic Stick was a favorite, and I seem to remember more bhangra than one would expect from a white guy who grew up in New York). John and Suhana's wedding reception was also a highlight and I felt honored to be there to celebrate with them.

When I lived in DC I was often in New York and could meet John for brunch or fancy cheese with wine in the afternoon or even the occasional live music show in a basement in Brooklyn. He always had some funny story to share and a spot-on critique of a recent movie and I always felt more cultured and in the know after seeing him. My move to San Francisco meant I saw less of him, but we still managed to meet for coffee on one of his trips to SF and that was when he told me he was going to be a father. The last time I saw him in person was right after his son Henryk was born, back in July 2009. I had never seen him so happy. He had not thought he would be able to have children and he truly cherished Henryk.

I knew John had had a stint in the hospital with pneumonia a little less than a year ago but he didn't tell me until he was out and "fine." I guess I should have known there was more to the story but I believed him when he said he was OK. I was shocked this morning to see in my email a note from a mutual friend letting me know that Stef had passed away. I am so sad that he is gone and I feel even worse that I didn't get a chance to say goodbye. And, not to make this about me, but I am horrified with myself that I wasn't there for him during his final fight. I have spent the whole day doing little more than wishing I had known what was going on so I could have been as good a friend to Stef as he always was to me.

I missed my chance to say it in person, but here is what I would have said:
Yo Stef. I am so glad that I knew you and got to be a part of your life. I really admired who you were and how you lived your life and I felt lucky to be your friend. I always felt like you were looking out for me and taking care of me even in ways I wasn't aware of. Thank you for being such a good friend. I wish your son could have grown up knowing you. As a mother of a 2 year old myself I can hardly imagine how hard it must be for you to leave him. I hope that he will grow up surrounded by people who knew and loved you and who can share with him all of the wonderful memories so he will know how lucky he was to have you for a dad, even if just for a short time.

You will be greatly missed.

It only took us six years to find out

On Saturday night Eric and I went out on a date. And because we are parents in our early 30s living in Florida, obviously that means just one thing: we went mini-golfing. 

What we didn't know was that it was National Miniature Golf Day. A whole game of mini-golf was just 99 cents!

If you haven't heard of National Miniature Golf Day before that might be because it only started in 2007. It is always celebrated on the second Saturday of May, which I think means it might always be the day before Mother's Day.

Perhaps we have a new family tradition.

Never hurts to ask

During nap times on our very successful camping trip, we drove around a bit so the boys could sleep. After many hours at the beach, we decided to get some ice cream at the camp store. Eric was driving so I ran in and ordered a cone with mint chocolate chip ice cream.

The woman started to scoop up the cone and determined that there wasn't enough ice cream left in the bucket to make a whole cone. (This was not really true. There was still at least a pint of ice cream in there, it was just all in the corners where her big scooper couldn't get.) So she pulled out the bucket and put it on the floor.

"You aren't going to let that ice cream go to waste, are you?" I asked.

"I'm just going to throw it away," she replied. "What, do you want it?"

Guess what I said.

The best part was the looks I got while sitting on the curb with the bucket waiting for Eric to circle around and pick me up.

Going camping

Once Commencement is over on Sunday, Eric will have completed his first year of teaching and we will be celebrating by going camping with our two small children. As I get us ready for this first-time-camping-in-Florida adventure, I started thinking about what might be different about camping in Florida compared to other places. 

In San Francisco, living indoors is all about keeping out the wind (oh how I hate that cold cold wind!).

In Florida, shelter is first and foremost about separating people and all other living creatures: people in, everyone else out. The AC is nice too, but the critters send people indoors well before the heat does. 

And I am not just talking about all the bugs - though there are a LOT of bugs. Maybe it is the alligators swimming around in my backyard, but Florida seems to me to have more than its share of deadly creatures, or at least creatures that can really hurt you. Or just really gross you out. Bad.

Our plan is to go for two nights and three days. We will be camping on a beach and are crossing our fingers there will be some shade for a nap during the hottest part of the day, or the tent might actually cook us.