Notes from the Cafe Fiasco

William J. Wallace

This is the approximate text of the short impromptu eulogy that I gave for Bill Wallace on April 27th. It's been difficult to write since the funeral, which is why this piece is so late. Even in the short amount of time that I knew him, I became very attached to Bill and his death was a blow to me as well as the whole family. Bill was quite the guy, as I hope the piece below shows.

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For those of you that don't know me, my name is Tom Spriggs and, despite the white beard, I am probably the youngest of the Wallace clan - at least if measured by time in place. Most of you knew Bill for much longer than I did. It was only four years ago that I found Denise Wallace on a blind date, the woman who will soon become my wife, and when you found Denise, you also found Billy Wallace. The Wallace's all stuck together and Bill was the glue.

The fact that I am the most "outside" of the clan may give me some perspective on Bill that I would like to share with you. At least this is who Bill was to me.

I found from the beginning that I got along well with Bill, but then many most people did - this was one of Bill's particular gifts. It was very easy to become Bill Wallace's friend. In fact, anyone who knew Bill for more than ten minutes was probably considered a friend by Bill and he put great stock in friends - almost as much as he did in family.

Of course, that didn't mean that even if you were Bill's friend he wouldn't put you through some hoops, since he had a distinct trickster element to his personality. And as a prospective son-in-law the hoops could be somewhat high.  

Case in point: Being somewhat old fashioned, when I decided to ask Denise to marry me last year, I went to Bill first to ask permission. So, I pulled him aside at a New Year's gathering of the family and told him that I was planning to ask Denise to marry me and asked if that was okay with him. He just sort of stopped and stared at me for what seemed to me to be a very long time with a blank expression. I, of course, panicked. Once he saw that he "had me", he then displayed the trademark twinkle in his eye and he put out his hand and welcomed me to the family. I had been "gotten" by Bill Wallace. It wouldn't be the last time.

Besides or maybe because of this devilish side to his nature, Bill was really a great teacher. And here are some of the lessons that I learned from Bill Wallace over the time that I was privileged to know him:

1) Do what you have to do and don't complain about it.  Whining doesn't make for a fun environment and you're going to have to do a lot of things that aren't fun over the course of your life.  Why make things worse for everyone including yourself?

2) Do the right thing, (it's really not that hard to figure out what that is).

3)  Work hard - as we all know Bill held many jobs during this life, sometimes multiple jobs, in order to support his family.  Hard work was a part of who Bill was and it resulted in good things for him and his family.

4) Try to have some fun while doing the previous three things.

Denise mildly upbraided him one day not long ago as he again tried to put yet another corny joke where it just wouldn't fit. His instant reply was, "Well, you have to keep trying." And try he did. Over the four years that I knew him, my initial admiration for him grew into a type of awe as I saw him battle Parkinson's disease everyday and work very, very hard to be as healthy as he could be, both for himself and for all of us. He didn't complain or make it a bit deal, he just did it. There was a lot of man behind that impish smile and the corny jokes.

Over time, I also came to admire his courage. Not just because of what he did in response to his Parkinson's, but in the way that he had lived his life. Bill Wallace was someone who had the courage to live an open and trusting life even though he knew that some people would eventually disappoint him or even take advantage of him at times. It wasn't that he wasn't cognizant of these possibilities for Bill was a very smart man, but rather he was courageous enough to not make his life smaller because of them. For me, this was Bill's great lesson.

So Bill lived by very simple principles. And, as those of us who have tried to also do so know, this is not easy to do.  But Bill was a master at all these aspects of life and I, for one, am going to miss the lessons that he gave us every day.

My 30 Seconds

All of my fans will want to check out my picture which appears in the fabulous Boston Globe (Page B4) today. I was making the scene at SOWA yesterday. They even got my best side.

Opening Day

I'm still not sure who's playing shortstop. Is Bobby Valentine sure who's playing shortstop?

Lydia and Smudgy

"To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best day and night to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight and never stop fighting." - e e cummings

I woke up this morning to a few soft taps from a paw on my back - taps that weren't really there, but were memories of my beloved cat Smudge waking me up two years ago on this date. He was very, very sick and I had decided after listening to his labored breathing all the previous day that for his own good, he needed to be put down. So, the night before, I sadly put his limp form in the bed next to me so that we could sleep together one last time and he didn't move all night. That is until it came time to eat in the morning and then he was up and poking me with a look on his face like "What's the matter with you? You're not feeding me?" One last assertion of who he was and a reminder that who he was was formidable even when terminally ill.

I am reminded of this not only because of the anniversary, but because my foster mother Lydia Bullock Touloumtzis passed away early this Sunday at the age of 88. It is no trivialization of either to say that she and Smudge had certain personality traits in common.

Lydia was the mom of my best friend in junior high and high school - Mike Touloumtzis. As has been recounted here before, this period was a perilous time for me. My own mom became sick with cancer and died during my high school years, my father went into a deep depression as a result, and I was pretty much left on my own. The Touloumtzis family was kind and generous enough to emotionally, if not physically, take me in as I tried to work through what had happened to me.

At the center of this was Lydia - who earned my infinite respect by not trying to be my mother. She was always there when I needed to talk or when I was upset about something - usually smoking a cigarette in the small kitchen in the big house and looking into a distance for things that only she seemed to be able to see. But it was clear to both of us that she wasn't my mother and that the one that I had lost could not be replaced. And, of course, she was right. Most of us only get one and when you lose her, she's unreplacable. This is the sad fact that the Touloumtzis family now must deal with.

She knew this was the case because she knew herself and her uniqueness very, very well and thereby knew the uniqueness of others. Like Smudge she had a firm grasp on who she was even if, at times, she couldn't find the room to express it. She certrainly expressed it at the end though - she refused to go to the hospital from the nursing home where she was trying to recover from multiple physicial insults even during a life-threatening crisis. She had had enough - a new great granddaughter had just arrived - that generation was now settled and thriving, the house where she had lived for 50 some odd years had been sold and handed off to another family who would raise their children there, and even I, the perpetual late bloomer, was finally getting married.

She was done. Staying alive was no longer worth the pain that she had to go through to maintain the state and there was little to look forward to. So, when the time came, she wrapped it up. Very cut and dried. Very Lydia.

So maybe it wasn't Smudge poking me this morning. Maybe it was Lydia reminding me that it was time to get up and fight the battle to be myself one more day - one more once - until it's time not to do it any more. It's the Yankee thing to do, and the Smudgy thing to do, and the Lydia thing to do. Thank you both for the reminder.

Phil and Climate Change

It is Groundhog Day and Punxsutawney Phil has been doing his thing in Pennsylvania - predicting six more weeks of winter.  But I wonder: is that six more weeks of winter winter or is it the winter that we've had so far that, for us New Englanders, isn't really winter?

Susan G. Komen and Planned Parenthood

News has come that the Susan G. Komen Foundation, the countries largest anti-breast cancer foundation, has caved in to the Right on their funding of screening of women for breast cancer. They have stated that they will no longer fund organizations that are "under investigation" and since the right wing House of Representatives has started such an investigation (shades of Joseph McCarthy) this gives Komen an excuse to bow to the wills of those who would put Planned Parenthood out of business.

Mom had breast cancer - both breasts, two radical masectomies one after the other - the second cancer being diagnosed right after the first surgery. This was back in the 60's - in the days before lumpectomies, when cancer was pretty much a death sentence. She didn't die of cancer, but she did go through a version of hell before she died of something else.

Watching her go through this taught me a very important lesson - cowardice is not a survival attribute when you're dealing with cancer. The only way to really deal with cancer is face on - just as my mother did. This turned out to be a very valuable lesson 40 years later when I was diagnosed with my own version of cancer. Compared to her, I had cancer light. But I still benefited from her teachings on the subject. When something like cancer happens to you, you've got to stand up and deal with it.

Unfortunately, the folks at the Susan G. Komen Foundation haven't learned this simple lesson from the people that they purport to serve. And therefore they have proved themselves to be not worthy of the people who they want to help. Cowardice in the face of political pressure is an ugly thing. It's almost as ugly as cancer itself. You'd think that the Komen Foundation people would have figured this out by now.

Anniversary

I've been radioactive for exactly one year today.  One year of cnacer treatment down, four more to go before I'm considered clear.

I celebrated by recreating February and sleeping until noon.

Rex and Pablo

So why would I awaken this morning thinking about Rex Trailer - a local TV kids show host from the 1950's and his "sidekick" Pablo?  I hardly even remember Pablo.

The mind is a very strange thing sometimes.

I-O-Way

Thanks, Iowa. You've given us a major Presidential candidate that doesn't believe in the theory of evolution. Sure it's not something in the ethanol?

A Message from the Original Cafe Fiasco

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