Boston

Moments after I heard about the tragedy in Boston, I thought to myself … this is just the thing I want to call up my

Larry Davis meets Brooks Robinson, wearing his Boston Marathon jacket.

father and see if he knows already.

As many of you know my father died in July of last year from Mesothelioma. Now I can only think to myself how the conversation would go.

Monday morning while I was listing to Kelcey Carlson’s husband on the radio reminding me of her love to run and that she was back in Boston to do another marathon, I was reminded that my dad went last year.  I was not invited and it too brings up painful memories of how his wife never accepted most of our family, but that was what I was thinking that morning. By the afternoon, however, I was shocked to see what was happening in the city my dad loved.

My father lived and worked for years in Boston. It was about a decade after he started running that he moved to the state directly to our north. He worked for New Balance, a company based on running shoes, and took me to the marathon itself year after year. I remember once driving along the course and trying to see my cousins who were running the marathon in a relay. My father ran it a number of times and when he didn’t he was always keeping tabs on it. So I’m am really glad that last year it was a big event for him. He was terribly sick and so very proud of his wife’s daughter for gaining admittance AND racing a week or so after her appendix burst. They all went up and completed the race as my dad waited it out in the hotel room. At that point my father had so very little energy, he was wheelchair bound and his wife did a wonderful job getting him there for the last possible time.

Had it not been for asbestos and the resulting cancer that took his ability to run and ultimately his life, we would’ve been able to talk about what went on that terrible afternoon, on Patriots day in the city we shared.