When I was growing up, a bunch of boys lived in our neighborhood: my brothers Joe and Phillip were part of a pack that included Ricky Ray; Donny and Jimmy Loftus; Timmy Nave (who was the only bilingual one of the group because his parents were deaf and he used ASL); Billy, Joey and Paul Breen (whose fourth brother, John, was too young to join the play); and the star of N. Wilson Boulevard, Kurt Page.
For a brief time, Kurt was famous, at least in Nashville and the SEC football world: in the early 1980s,
he was the quarterback for Vanderbilt University (still holds the record for most yards passed). My Kurt Page scrapbook is around here somewhere.
All or some combination of these boys, along with my father, often played basketball and baseball together, and some of them (not our father) played with their Johnny West and Geronimo action figures. (Remind me to tell the story of when I and my Barbie doll were invited to join the activity; it was the scene of my first feminist outburst.) Many of them went to the Knights of Columbus (KC) 544 swimming pool, where I spent most of my days reading. (Sometimes I would get in the pool where Joe and Kurt plus Danny Francescon -- who did not live in the neighborhood but was rather a school friend -- would throw me back and forth over the water.)
In the summer of 2018, Joe, a high school coach who ran a 7-minute mile, was diagnosed with lung cancer (adenocarcinoma) despite having never smoked in his life. (Our father died of lung cancer in 2001, more than 40 years after he had smoked his last cigarette.)
Now, after three years of state-of-the-art treatment, Joe has been told by his doctors that there's not much left for them to do. He is home, receiving hospice care, eating as much as he likes, watching whatever sport is on TV, taking all the naps, and receiving many, many visitors.
Joey (excuse me, Joe) Breen has dropped by often, and his brother Billy (ahem, Bill) stays in contact. Danny Francescon, who now happens to be Joe's brother-in-law (their wives are sisters), stops in almost daily. We have lost track of the Loftuses and Timmy, and poor Ricky Ray (who lived closest to our house, about three doors up the street) died several years ago after a long stretch of bad health.
We have been waiting for a Kurt sighting. "Where is Kurt," my sisters and I have been texting. We bugged our brother Phillip: "What's going on with Kurt?"
Anxiety is now relieved. Kurt visited over the weekend. My sister Fran sent this photo to our sibling text thread, warming our hearts. Our sister Ellen responded, "Old friends are best."
Our mother and father would be verklempt; they loved Kurt Page. If we ask him, he will say he loved them too.
We knew it at the time and are certain of it now as we experience this new phase of Joe's life -- our fortune, our many blessings. Hold those tight and let go of the rest.
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