Never Better | All Things Considered

A Message from the Editor

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We know all too well from pop psychology and our own experience

that a significant loss in our lives is processed only gradually, in

stages, moving ever so painfully toward final acceptance. Only

in looking back can we identify how our thoughts and actions

evolved to the point where life, inexorably changed, had meaning

once again.

During the end stages of my husband’s terminal illness,

when I could no longer experience his companionship, his insight,

and, most especially, his glorious voice, I found some comfort in

rediscovering that voice in his writings. For months I scoured

desks, bureaus, boxes, computer files, anything that might hold

the precious words and thoughts. Speeches, published articles,

personal tributes, journal entries—all I compiled and arranged into

what I hoped would be a lasting gift for our family and dear friends.

During the process, “The Days of My Life,” my original title for

Gene’s biographical memoir, evolved into “A Boy from Lawrence.”

Gene loved the city of his birth, Lawrence, Massachusetts, loved

being a boy in Lawrence, and carried that boy with him throughout

life. What better title for the book he never wrote, but lived.

Counselors tell us that scrapbooking helps us deal with grief.

For me, this scrapbook of Gene’s writings is one baby step

towards acceptance and healing. For all of us, this book gives voice

once again to the master teacher who reaches out and inspires us

to live well and “Do good.”



                                                    — Sally A. Connolly

Excerpt from "Commencement Address"

We are never more fully human and more fully alive, we are never closer to being our best and purest self, the world is never safer than at that moment when we choose to do the loving thing. And sometimes that loving thing is no more than a wink, a smile, or the touch of our hand.

Today, both Yohannie and Breeda, in their beautiful tributes, showed all of us how lovely the loving thing can be when it sounds like “Thank you for this time in my life.” When our days begin to run out—in the long, long distant future, I hope—and we think back on our lives, the important things will be clear to us.

We will not weep because we did not get all the toys we were told to get.

We will not weep because we were not the financial successes the world urged us to be.

We will not weep because some plan fell through or the Joneses got ahead of us.

But our eyes may fill with tears for the hand we did not hold,

for the word we did not say,

for the word we did not keep,

for the stand we did not take,

for the child we did not kiss,

for the tear we did not dry,

for the ear we did not lend,

for the smile we did not share,

for the forgiveness we did not grant,

for the pardon we did not ask,

for the husband or wife or mother or father

or brother or sister

or son or daughter or friend

we did not honor every day of their lives.