1953 Mary Ellen   Dad was always a rather sober quiet man, always willing to be there when I needed him . . . He took great pride in how he ran and operated his business and I know that his customers always held him in the highest regard.
I'll never forget the time Dad and I took a trip to Niagara Falls NY by train to visit aunt Kathleen and uncle Bill . . . I was about 9 or 10 years old, just the two of us .. it was a time that I felt the closest to him.
His life was very settled and routine.
He opened the store at 8:00 am .. usually ate lunch out at a few favorite chosen restaurants .. he closed the store at 8:00 pm came home and ate dinner .. laid on the couch and watched the news and then to bed . . . day after day
On Sunday our lives consisted of Meet the Press and Face the Nation on TV and then to church later that morning . . . I know that dad had a passion for politics, but he was never able to vote because he was never able to become an official US citizen.
I never really knew what his politics was .. I'll have to discuss some of that with Kathleen .. She'd probibly Know that the best
anyhow, then lunch out with the family and/or with the McCorgarys and the Steens, but he always needed to make time on sunday afternoons to write the order at the store . . . Ray McCorgary (Kathleens Husband) was dad's store manager (Cleary's Market) and Dale Steen (Barbara's husband) owned store/s of his own (Steen's IGA) my grandfather on mom's side was a store owner .. my mother's brother was a store owner and at one time my half brother (Danny) owned his own grocery store . . . So our families had a lot of business conversation in common.
I was basically raised with their kids .. Barbara, Danny, and Kathleen were more like aunts and uncle to me . . . Mary Ellen is the sister who I was raised with .. we had the real (big sister / little brother) relationship ( @%?&#x!!!*- ) were ok now. She's the greatest . . . I just needed to grow up . . :)

When dad died, it was a shock to us all . . . not long after I was born .. dad had an operation which removed a portion of his lung, he had emphamazima,
I'm sure due to his smoking. and also due to an incedent with a 'Vics Inhailer' ( I don't really know all of the details on this ) but somehow a piece of that got into his lung and caused some damage.
I don't think dad was a heavy smoker, but I know that he smoked a rather heavy cigarette, filterless camels, So dad was never in very good health during the years that I knew him.
Although he was under strong advice to quit smoking, and I remember times when he tried, I don't think he ever really did. anyhow, because he didn't get enough oxygen to his bones, they became brittle. one day when he was at the store,
click to play video he pulled out a drawer and it fell all the way out, when he tried to catch it, he broke a disc in his back. after he got home from the hospital from getting that 'repaired', I think he was groggy from some pain medication
and slipped on a plastic mat and fell and broke a joint in his side and was rushed immediately back into surgery. After the hip surgery was complete and they were sowing him up,
thats when a blood clot let loose and killed him on the operating table, ( Friday, March 29th 1974 ) he never awoke. It was something that none of us ever expected.
I just thank God he didn't suffer and that he felt no pain. Dad was a rather quiet man, he had a confident wisdom about him that could reason with you with just a look. He had no problem in telling me that he was proud of me and that he appreciated the work I did for him. I'll never forget him for that.

. . . . . Robby