Monthly Archives: August 2023

Posted in opinion

LIVE WITH JOY, CHEER THE TEAM, EAT THE CAKE

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Finally, it is college football season once again.  I have waited almost eight months for the season to begin, and yet, it is tinged with some sadness.  The conference realignment – and the collapse of the Pac 12 – has made this season bittersweet.  Almost all of the traditions and rivalries will end this season and the Pac 12 teams will scatter to the winds.  Or the Midwest.  The advent of NIL (name, image, likeness) has forever changed the landscape of college sports.  The notion of a “student athlete” has been reduced to a money grab.  A few months ago I suggested to a friend that the major colleges stop providing academic scholarships to the big-time sports stars so that deserving students who actually want to attend college for an education might use those slots.  The major conferences in football and basketball could develop semi-pro programs, intended for the sole purpose of providing a pipeline of players for the pros.  No pretense of attending those pesky classes would be required, just play ball and collect the money. Regardless of how all this shakes out, college football has changed forever and we either go with it or give it up. I’m not ready to give it up.

Last week, buried in the headlines about conference realignments, was an uplifting story about Sister Jean, the team chaplain for the Loyola Ramblers men’s basketball team.  The sister turned 104 on August 21 and she is still going strong. The Sister was born Jean Dolores Schmidt, in 1919, the same year as our mother.  She was raised in San Francisco, so I like to imagine that Sister Jean and our mother crossed paths at some point, although I suspect Sister Jean was much more serious than our mom, who loved a good gin rickey when she saw one.  Sister Jean attended St. Paul’s High School in the beautiful St. Paul’s Cathedral in SF and played on the girl’s basketball team.  After graduation in 1937 she entered the Sisters of Charity of the Blessed Virgin Mary convent in Iowa.  She eventually returned to California to further her education, earning BA and MA degrees.  She taught school in California until 1961, when she moved to Chicago to teach at Mundelein College. She was hired by Loyola in 1991 when it merged with Mundelein.  She planned to retire in 1994 but was asked by the administration to stay on as the team chaplain to the men’s basketball team to help student athletes keep up their grades so they could maintain their eligibility to play. Imagine that.

Sister Jean cheering on the team in 2018

She steadily provided counsel to the students and cheered on the basketball team without fanfare. In 2018 she became a household name when the team made a Cinderella run to the national semifinals — the farthest Loyola Chicago has made it in the NCAA Championship Tournament since 1963. Sister Jean’s spirited antics on the sidelines attracted national media attention and won over the hearts of viewers across the country.  Afterwards she quipped, “It only took me 98 years to become an overnight sensation.” In March 2021, after getting vaccinated against COVID-19, and at the age of 101, Sister Jean traveled to Indianapolis to watch Loyola beat the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets and eventually make it to the Sweet Sixteen.

Sister Jean celebrating her 104th birthday

Today Sister Jean still keeps the door to her office open for students to drop in and chat. She is still active as the team chaplain, emailing scouting reports, encouragement and advice to each of the players after every game. And she still opens every home game with a prayer, in which she urges the refs to make good calls, the players to share the ball and God to nudge the Ramblers to a big W. Last year, at the age of 103, she published a book, Live with Purpose!,  filled with her trademark sense of humor and good-natured observations about her century of life.  On her birthday last Monday, she celebrated with the students and CAKE!  I love this woman!  Today she will throw out the first pitch at the Cubs’ game against the Brewers at Wrigley Field and on August 31, Sister Jean will be honored with a block party at Loyola’s Water Tower Campus.

What’s not to admire about a woman who lives her life with joy, cheers on college sports teams and eats cake?  She is my new role model.

 

 

 

Posted in travel

Hilary – Much Ado . . .

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by Bob Sparrow

Flooding in Palm Springs area

Over this past weekend, while most people in southern California were preparing their homes and yards for the arrival of Hurricane Hilary, we, Mark & Kathy Johnson, Bob & Jeanne Pacelli and Linda & I, headed to San Diego to celebrate the 50th wedding anniversary of the Johnsons, who had rented a beach-front home on Mission Bay.  We were heading right into what was projected to be the teeth of the storm.

Hilary, at the time, was rated a Category 3 hurricane; I looked up the definition:

Winds up to 129 mph!  Devastating damage will occur: well-built framed homes may incur major damage or removal of roof, decking and gable ends.  Many trees will be snapped or uprooted, blocking numerous roads.

Road to Death Valley

The last time a hurricane of any category hit California was in 1939!  Undaunted, we headed down Interstate 5 to San Diego on Saturday morning and noticed that the freeway was packed . . . going the other way, out of San Diego.  We were clearly going ‘up’ the ‘down’ staircase?  We wondered, is this a smart move?  We concluded, “Ahhh, we’ll be fine.”

Before we left home, we made sure all of our outside furniture/umbrellas were secured or put away.  We did the same at the Mission Bay home on Saturday evening.  We were preparing for the worst, which we were told by local meteorologists that it would be Sunday afternoon through Sunday evening.  By the time we arrived at the beautiful bay-side home, Hilary had been down-graded to a Category 2 hurricane, meaning winds up to 110 miles per hours – still significant!

The group weathering the storm at Mission Bay

Once there, we got more news, Hilary had been further downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane, and perhaps just a ‘Tropical Storm’ (winds 65 mph).  It was actually fairly balmy as we sat on our patio and watched volleyball and other various activities on the beach.

We could not have had a better place to watch the storm, in fact, once we got there and parked our car, we never got back into it until four days later when it was time to drive home.  Aside from a great pontoon boat ride, we had two dinners at the Oceana restaurant at the Catamaran Hotel, which was on the beach about 100 yards from our house.

An Oceana Hurricane!

We were getting a light rain most of the day along with mild winds, but nothing extraordinary – we kept waiting for Hilary to hit.  She did finally hit, but it was more of a playful slap than a hit.  Oddly enough, we were disappointed that we weren’t going to experience a once-in-a-generation hurricane/tropical storm in southern California.  As it turnd out, the most ‘catastrophic’ thing that happened was our power went out for an hour or so and we were forced to use a flashlight and candles to play some games at the house until the power came back on.  As it turns out, the deserts and the mountains got hit much worse than any of our coastal cities.  Rain is, indeed, unusual in southern California in August, and the Tropical Storm did cause some major flooding the desert and mountain areas, but it just seemed a little anti-climatic to us on the San Diego coast after all the hype.

As it turned out the closest we got to a hurricane was the one I ordered at the Oceana bar.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in travel

Mulligans in Michigan

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by Bob Sparrow

Traverse City, Michigan

It had been thirteen years since I jumped on a plane in Orange County to Detroit on a Monday morning to go to work, and then flew home on Friday night – yes, I ‘commuted’ to Troy, Michigan, mostly every week for five years, so I knew the way to Michigan.  But this trip was not about work, it was about golf.  Actually, it turned out that golf was a lot of work!  The Sagers, Budds, VanBoxmeers, and us, headed to Traverse City in northern Michigan to enjoy four of the over 1,000 golf courses in the state of Michigan.  Those who have been to northern Michigan understand just how beautiful it is – lots of trees and everything is so green!  We got lucky with the weather, as it was not too hot, not too humid, but, as Goldilocks would say, “Just right”.  Our lodging for the first half of the week was in an awesome, four-bedroom condo at the A-Ga-Ming golf complex.

We traveled on a Sunday and had a tee time at the A-Ga-Ming Sundance course set for Monday morning, but the Sagers’ and VanBoxmeers’ golf clubs decided they wanted to spend some extra time in Dallas.  So, no golf on Monday; our free day of Tuesday was rescheduled for golf and on our golf day of Monday was rescheduled for a self-directed tour of Traverse City, where we had lunch on the roof top bar of the Hotel Indigo, that provided us a beautiful view of the West Arm of Grand Traverse Bay.

Happy to be playing the 19th hole

We took this free day as an opportunity to visit an old friend of Linda’s and mine, Shiela Nittman, who used to live in our neighborhood back in Orange, but she and husband, Helmut, were now retiring in their beautiful second home overlooking Torch Lake, which was only about twenty minutes from where we were staying.  It was a great visit, as Shiela regaled us with stories of the surrounding area.

Later that day we also visited a friend of John’s, Cindy, who lived in the area and used to own the Colorado Mining Co. restaurant in Denver and knew John when he played for the Denver Avalanche, NHL hockey team.  She had one story after another, either about the hockey players coming into the restaurant and causing havoc, or the night Elvis came in and they made him a huge peanut butter, jelly and bacon sandwich.  We ended the evening having some indigenous white fish and walleye at Gray Gables, a nice restaurant in Charlevoix.

Room from The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet

Looking for golf balls in a field of sunflowers

After another day of bad golf for me, we changed locations from our four-bedroom condo in Ag-A-Ming to the Grand Traverse Resort & Spa, a nice, but dated, facility.  Our room looked like something right out of 50s.  We had a free day, meaning no golf, to just tour the area, so we went into Traverse City for breakfast, then stopped by a large field of sunflowers that we spotted along the road; there was a place to pull over and take photos, so we did.  Dinner on the 15th floor of the Grand Traverse Resort & Spa building – beautiful view, just an OK dinner.

After three rounds of frustrating golf for ‘Double Bogey Bob’, that’s me, I can’t tell you how excited I was that we booked the Jack Nichlaus designed course, ‘The Bear’ for our last day of golf in Michigan.  Here’s the description of the course:

“One of the toughest golf courses in America, featuring Scottish terraced fairways, tiered greens, deep grassy roughs, moguls, mounds and deep pot bunkers, along with lakes, ponds, forests, streams and fruit orchards.”

Another broken club!!!

The course was about this friendly

Oh great, all that to deal with plus FRUIT ORCHARDS . . . on a golf course??!!  I didn’t sleep well the night before, wondering whether I had enough balls to get through even the front nine!  But, as it turned out, it wasn’t as bad as it sounded . . . IT WAS WORSE!!!  It took three hours to play the front nine!!!  Not wanting to miss our dinner reservation and being totally frustrated with ‘The Bear’, we quit after 12 holes and headed to the showers!  Travel tip: Don’t play this course unless you are a very good golfer, are in a very good mood and have plenty of time . . . and balls!

Our last supper was at the Turtle Creek Hotel & Casino, and it was probably our best of the trip, made better by the fact that Camus wine was half-priced, and after what we’d been through, we all needed something to help us forget that round, or two-thirds of a round, of golf.

Northern Michigan golf: Check

 

 

 

Posted in Family

WHAT WE LEAVE BEHIND

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By Suzanne Sparrow Watson

Thank you to everyone who responded to my post about the passing of my husband, Alan.  It has been a trying few weeks, but your notes and good wishes made a bad situation just a bit brighter.  I do not plan to dwell on this subject, and I promise that in my next blog I will return to writing about fun subjects like why we have national donut day or rant about what is going to happen to the Rose Bowl now that the Pac 12 is the Pac 4.  But today I want to share some thoughts about my experience that might be of help to you.

As regular readers of this blog know, last fall my friend Pat Miles Zimmerman and I published a book that built on her experience after her husband died.  Over the two years that it took to complete the book I listened to the widows’ experiences and read the advice from professionals in an interested, but perhaps detached, way.  After all, I was not a widow.  I did learn some tips from the chapters on legal and financial issues, but being the Type A that I am, I already had my affairs in order, had a great estate attorney and a trusted financial advisor of 20 years.  The other chapters, dealing with more emotional issues I read with interest, but could not relate to them.  Now, all of the sadness and sentiment of being widowed has hit me full force, and it is a gut-wrenching experience. So, here is some advice, that I strongly encourage you to consider.

First, what we leave behind for our surviving spouse can greatly influence the grieving process.  Because I had everything in order, in the few days Alan and I had after his diagnosis we were able to spend them talking about our life together, our family, and what he wanted for my future.  I did not have to scurry to collect passwords, bank account information or try to understand our investment strategies.  This has been invaluable.  I have read that losing a spouse is the worst kind of grief because it affects every single thing you do from the moment you wake up to the time you go to sleep.  It has been much harder than I anticipated, but at least I am afforded the luxury of simply missing him.  I cannot imagine that hurt being exacerbated by stress over not knowing how to pay bills or how to access his iPhone.  I urge everyone to get your affairs in order ahead of a crisis – it will pay great dividends in your emotional well-being and to some extent, help in the grieving process.  Last week one of Alan’s closest friends prepared a binder for his wife that contains all of the pertinent information she will need when he passes.  He told her, “This is for Alan.”  It touched me that Alan’s spirit left behind such a thoughtful, and practical, gesture.

Second, the legacy we leave behind is greatly influenced by how we treat everyone with whom we come into contact.  I have been overwhelmed by the beautiful cards and letters that friends have sent me, some relating stories about Alan and how they met him.  But I have been particularly touched by the employees at our club that have reached out to me expressing their sorrow at his passing.  They all said the same thing: he was always nice to them.  As one of the staff said, “I will miss him.  He was a good man.”  His niceness extended to others who worked with us. Two days after Alan died our air conditioner experienced a problem.  Ken, our regular A/C technician came to fix it and asked me where Alan was.  When he learned of his death, Ken got tears in his eyes and gave me a big hug.  He said, “He was always so good to me – made sure that I had water when it was hot and lent a hand when I needed it.” It makes me happy that the legacy of being good to people is also part of what Alan left behind.

Finally, maybe it pays to leave something a little quirky behind just to make your loved one smile.  I have gradually been going through Alan’s things, distributing sentimental items to the family, particularly his two sets of golf clubs which our two grandsons now possess.  I know that would make him very happy.  But he also left behind some curious items, among them 13 (!) new golf gloves, most still in the original packaging.  All I can imagine is that with all of his trips to the PGA Superstore he occasionally felt the need to purchase something, so he settled on golf gloves.  I had to laugh when I found them, and now our son-in-law won’t have to buy golf gloves for many years to come. I loved that Alan is still making me laugh, even after he’s gone.

Again, thank you for reaching out and all of your nice comments.  I know that I will eventually create a new normal.  I believe that life can still be beautiful, even when there’s broken parts.

Posted in Family

A Time of Tragedy & Comedy

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by Bob Sparrow

This theater logo, of the famous faces – Melpomene (tragedy) and Thalia (comedy), which is Greek in origin, has come to symbolize the last few weeks for me.  Incredible highs and incredible lows.  The tragedy obviously comes from the passing of Suzanne’s husband, Alan, in late July.  We all cried when we read the beautiful tribute she wrote here last week.  The comedy comes from a family reunion that was planned months ago and was on the weekend that immediately followed Alan’s passing.  While our hearts were with Suzanne, in Arizona, our funny bones were in our backyard during the ‘Gathering of Sparrows’.  This family’s sense of humor can be attributed to one man, our father, the original Jack Sparrow, or Poppins, as he was affectionately known.  Aside from being one of the nicest and most gentlemanly people that God put on this earth, he had a tremendous sense of humor, that has been passed on to his children, to our children, and to their children.  What an amazing legacy!

Poppins

The following are the players who attended the reunion, or ‘ReOnion’, as we called it, because . . . well, it sounded stupid: Brother Jack Sparrow and wife, Sharon; Jack’s kids Shelly, who flew in from Tucson and her daughter, Kate, who flew in from northern California; Jack’s son, Matt, who drove in from Tucson with his son, Jackson and daughter, Madelyn.  Sharon’s son, Brad, his wife Betsy and their three kids, Riley, Allie and Zack, who drove all the way from Placentia.  My kid, Stephanie and her husband Jason, and their two kids, Dylan and Emma; and Linda and my kids, Dana and husband, Joe, and their two kids, Addison and Mack, and our son, Jeff and his wife, Pam.   Great music was provided by participants who forwarded me their favorite songs that I put on a playlist that ended up being over 250 songs long.

Most of the time was spent outside, with the young kids in the pool and the adults trying to figure out if they wanted another pina colada from the never-ending machine, a cold Landshark from the beer cooler or a Klapper (cheap rum and diet cola) – some put a lime in it for a ‘Dapper Klapper’, there was also the option of using non-caffeinated cola, ‘Napper Klapper’, but no one was napping this weekend!  Cigars were also plentiful.  ‘Butcher Block Joe’, provided one of the tastiest BBQs I’ve ever had, with ribs, chicken, pulled pork and brisket – soooooooooooooooo good!!  Dana’s key lime pie put a perfect period at the end of that delicious sentence.  After dinner drinks included, pina coladas, Landsharks, Klap . . . OK, you know the drill.

Hoping that a picture is worth a lot more than my words, following are some photos from the event; the first being the ‘Hat Parade’ – where everyone had to wear a hat.  It seems I have a hat fetish, as I’ve got a closet full of them, so I felt it was time to come out of the closet . . . with my hats!!

Jackson’s ‘long arms’ provided the selfie of the ‘Hat Parade’

 

Pizza at the ‘Kids Table’

Kat & Madelyn – Two Beautiful Sparrows

 

Capt. Jack Sparrow at the ‘Wall of Masks’

 

 

 

 

 

Great food thanks to Joe & Dana

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A mustachiod Mac looking very suspecious

‘The Kids’ – Dana, Matt, Steph, Shelley, Jeff

‘Clinging Cousins’ Ems & Adz

We missed you, Sis!!!

Oh yeah, the other event that occurred is that I achieved one of the two major goals that every golfer has.  The first goal  being a ‘hole in one’, which I have never had in all my 66 years of golfing; the second is ‘shooting your age’, which I did accomplish last month by shooting a 79 at Yorba Linda Country Club.  I thought I was going to have to wait until I played ‘miniature golf’ when I was 104!