Monthly Archives: July 2024

Heartbreak in 2003: Part 1

Miscellaneous Posts
In the backyard with my big sister Patty – circa 1969-70

My big sister Patty and I are ten years apart. The first memory I have of her was from around 1968 or 1969. I was about five or six years old and she was in high school. My recollection is vague, so I’m not sure how much of it actually happened. She and our oldest sister Barbara wanted to take me to the playground at Richard E. Conniff Elementary School. The back gate of the school was at the end of the street where we grew up on Viewmont Avenue in east San Jose, California. 

I think it was during the summer because Mom was busy in the kitchen making dinner and the sun was still out. Of course, Mom was more than happy that the girls offered to get their travesio (mischievous) little brother out of her hair so she could finish preparing the food. After we entered through the back cyclone gate of the school, we marched right past the playground walking on the expansive lawn that served as a sort of athletic field. I hadn’t realized yet that my sisters had an ulterior motive.

We kept walking past the faculty parking lot at the front of the school and turned left on East Hills Drive toward the bigger houses uphill where the “rich” people lived. As we hiked up the street, it started getting hot and I started complaining with a grimace on my little flushed face. I think my sisters said, “we’re going for a walk because exercise is good for you.” My little legs were struggling trying to keep up with their long strides. I surely didn’t know what it meant to suffer, but I’m pretty sure I was suffering as I walked with heavy legs up the hill.

About halfway up East Hills Drive, we made a right turn on McCovey Lane. The streets in that neighborhood had names related to the San Francisco Giants. Candlestick Way and Davenport Drive were just a few short blocks away. McCovey Lane was even steeper! I had had enough. “I’m gonna tell Mom that we didn’t go to the playground,” I threatened as I huffed and puffed up the street. We were just going in a different way, they assured me. I soon figured out what was going on. They wanted to walk by the house of a boy one of them must have liked. 

We stopped in front of a house for a few seconds while my big sisters whispered and giggled together. I didn’t get it. I just wanted to have fun playing in the jungle gym and tan bark. No one told me that we were going on an epic journey to stop in front of some guy’s house for a few seconds. I was not a happy camper as we immediately turned back and headed down McCovey Lane, made a left turn on East Hills Drive, walked onto the Conniff campus, and finally made it to the jungle gym. 

After what seemed like only a few seconds, the girls told me it was time to go home for dinner. I was pissed as I stomped through the field and through the gate onto Viewmont Avenue. Next to the gate stood a majestic old eucalyptus tree. Some loose branches from that big tree had fallen to the ground. Lucky for me! I kicked one of the little branches down the street as we walked. That stick kept me occupied as I zigzagged following it. A few houses away from home, Barbara and Patty stopped to tell me I better not tell Mom we took the “long” way to the playground. I never did.

Within a couple of years, Barbara married her high school sweetheart. He was in the Air Force and they moved to Alaska. My oldest brother David was away at college. Patty, big brother Steve, baby sister Sisi, and I had a little more elbow room in the small house on 48 Viewmont Avenue, but just for a short time. A year after Barbara left, Patty moved into her college dorm at Santa Clara University (SCU), a Jesuit college about 30 minutes from home. Steve and I shared a room and Sisi had one all to herself.

I loved visiting Patty in her dorm room. I thought it was cool that she had a roommate and lived in an “apartment” like on TV. Sometimes Mom would let me hang out with Patty and her roommate Rosie at the dorm. I’m not sure what Mom had to do, but she had toddler Sisi in tow. Who knows what Steve was doing or where he was. It was always up to my big sisters to watch over me when Mom had things to do.

There was a huge swimming pool right next to Patty and Rosie’s dorm. They would sunbathe or check out boys while I jumped in and out of the water. Wearing cutoff shorts and standing shirtless at the edge of the pool with my little gut sticking out, I created all kinds of pretend scenarios. One minute, I would be a cliff diver in Acapulco or a deep sea diver in the Navy. The day usually ended with me going up to the dorm room to change back into dry clothes.

Patty ultimately met and married a SCU classmate from Bakersfield, California. Rick and Patty Robles were married at Mission Santa Clara on the SCU campus, and moved to Bakersfield right after the wedding. I spent a couple of weeks in Bakersfield each summer when I was 12, 13, and 14 years old. Patty taught summer school in the morning and Rick had a landscaping gig to supplement his teacher’s salary.

I would get up at the crack of dawn to help Rick on his rounds. We had to go early to beat the suffocating desert heat. The gigantic houses on the west side of town were my favorites. I couldn’t imagine living in a house with a basketball court, tennis court, and swimming pool in the backyard. Although Rick had a college degree from a prestigious university, in those neighborhoods, we were the jardineros (gardeners).

Once the sun went down and and Patty and Rick were done working for the day, we would go to the movies, get fast food from time to time, or watch a movie on cable TV. I didn’t get to do any of those things at home. We only went to the Mexican movies downtown when Dad was in the mood. Fast food and cable? Not a chance at 48 Viewmont Avenue. Rick taught me how to play golf and tennis, and we played hoops late at night at the neighborhood park with his little brother Dave. I loved going to Bakersfield!

Over the years, I grew closer to Patty. When Sandra and I were married, Patty and Sandra got along almost immediately. They had similar personalities: straightforward, no nonsense, and a strong maternal love. Marisa and Erica were excited when Rick, Patty, and their son Matt visited. And vice versa. They knew a trip to Bakersfield meant going to the mall, always on Tía Patty because she “didn’t have girls at home to spoil.”

In early 2003, Patty had been fighting what seemed like pneumonia or bronchitis. Doctors couldn’t clearly identify the problem and decided to do exploratory surgery. The morning of the operation, I called Patty to wish her luck and told her that Sandra and I would make the four-hour drive to Bakersfield to see her when she emerged from the operating room. During surgery, doctors confirmed that she had myocarditis, a type of virus in heart. She needed a heart transplant immediately. 

In the waiting room, we prayed for a positive outcome and anxiously waited for the doctor. Shortly before dawn, the doctor walked into the waiting room and asked Rick to step into the ICU. He asked me and his brother Dave to join him and the doctor. Once in the wide and antiseptic hallway of the ICU, the doctor, in a straightforward and unemotional manner, told my brother-in-law that Patty’s heart had weakened to the point of failure and that she would die within the hour. I was stunned! 

The suffering I experienced walking up East Hills Drive with Patty and Barbara some 33 years earlier was insignificant compared to the pain I felt at that moment, and the days and weeks that followed. St. Paul the Apostle tells us in Roman 5:3 to “rejoice in our suffering” as that leads to hope. There was no rejoicing and no hope when I stood at the podium to speak at Patty’s funeral a week later. I didn’t know at that moment what was in store for me. The remainder of 2003 would tell that story and take suffering to a new and numbing level.

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Note: Look for Part 2 of Heartbreak in 2003 next Wednesday

Rejoice in Suffering

Miscellaneous Posts, , , ,
James Lick Invitational Tournament ~ 1980
James Lick Invitational Tournament ~ 1980
Sitting it out.

To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering. ~Friedrich Nietzsche, 19th Century German Philosopher

* * *

I was in the 6th grade the first time my dad took me to the James Lick Invitational Tournament. It was a neighborhood institution that kicked off the holiday season. The gym was packed. I was mesmerized watching players run back and forth in a choreographed ballet to the soundtrack of basketball shoes squeaking on the polished maple floor. Cheerleaders jumped, chanted, twirled, and fired up the crowd. The whole scene was intoxicating.

I’ll never forget the excitement I felt watching the winning team cut down the nets as a souvenir and seeing the all-tournament team clutching trophies at center court as the crowd cheered. From then on, one of my dreams was to play in the tournament. I looked forward to someday standing on a ladder to snip a little piece of the net as a champion and imagined holding an all-tournament player trophy of my own.

Six years later, I had my chance. As a senior at James Lick High School, I was co-captain and starting shooting guard for the varsity basketball team. We won our first game on opening night. I had a good game and earned a top 10 spot on the all-tournament vote tally. So far so good. My stomach churned with excitement and anticipation.

After the game, a bunch of students celebrated the victory at the neighborhood Round Table Pizza. My teammates and I walked into the place like conquering heroes. On the way home, my friend lost control of his car and crashed it head-on into a telephone pole. A few hours later, I was sitting in the Kaiser emergency room as a doctor stitched the deep cut on my forehead. The doctor said no to basketball for a week. 

It felt like my dog had died. I suffered sitting on the bench wearing jeans and a letterman jacket watching my team lose the next two games. Something that I had wanted since the 6th grade went up in smoke right before my eyes. There would be no nets to cut down, no all-tourney trophy to hold at mid-court, no cheering crowd. I replayed the car hitting that pole over and over in my mind. Little did I know that those two nights helplessly sitting on the bench wouldn’t be the last time my heart would ache.

Suffering is part of life. The central story of Christianity is the suffering Jesus endured at the hands of his enemies. Buddhists believe that suffering is a natural state of living. Nineteenth century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche once said that “to live is to suffer.” Ancient philosophers don’t have the last word on suffering. A couple of 20th-century lyricists come to mind. They put into simple words what highbrow intellectuals have been telling each other for thousands of years.

Jose Alfredo Jiménez, arguably Mexico’s greatest composer, wrote in the mid-20th century about emotional pain and suffering.

La vida no vale nada. Comienza siempre llorando. Y así llorando se acaba. (Life is worthless. It always starts out crying and, like that, it ends crying.) 

His massive body of work contains beautiful and elegant lyrics on life’s struggles. The concept of suffering consumed him so much that he ultimately drank himself to death. Cirrhosis of the liver took his life at 47 years old.

American country music icon Hank Williams also wrote haunting lyrics about pain and anguish. His music brings life to the agony of everyday living, loving and loss.

The silence of a falling star. Lights up a purple sky. And as I wonder where you are, I’m so lonesome, I could cry.

The official cause of the 29 year-old singer’s death was heart failure caused by the combination of alcohol and morphine, no doubt to soothe his pain.

Suffering is loosely defined as experiencing pain, sorrow, or hardship. It comes in all forms. According to Buddhists, there are generally three kinds of suffering: mental and emotional torment, physical pain, and death. Catholic tradition adds two more: humiliation and physical exhaustion. More than 4,000 years of philosophy, spirituality, and scholarship tell us that there’s no way to avoid one or more of these types of suffering on a daily basis.

When we think of suffering, big things come to mind: a fatal illness, death, a break-up, physical pain caused by a car accident, broken limbs, or migraine headaches. Suffering also comes in small packages. A flat tire, getting to work late, a gossipy co-worker, and an ankle sprain can all cause some level of mental torment, physical pain, and humiliation. 

Like most people, I always believed that life was all about having fun interrupted by a few hard times here and there. As a kid, I lived with both parents and five brothers and sisters in a safe environment, played baseball with neighborhood kids at the school down the street, and basketball on my driveway. We always had food to eat and had the same roof over our heads until we left the nest. It never dawned at me that life could be anything but wonderful with minor exceptions.

In high school, things got more complicated as the pendulum started to swing. It hurt when Dad furrowed his brow and shook his head in disappointment or Mom was upset at me for one thing or another. Focusing on academic performance, pursuing athletic accomplishments, and managing relationships began to eat up more of my time. Mental, emotional, and physical suffering followed. Nevertheless, suffering was still the exception, not the rule.

Life after high school was hard. I flunked out of San Jose State University after three semesters. Despite a sharp intellect and a solid work ethic, I embarked on a string of dead end jobs. I agonized over my circumstances knowing that my natural talents were not visible to my work mates or future employers. Burying myself into books had no practical purpose for the arc my life was taking. I grew frustrated and my anguish accelerated.

Suffering was the order of the day everyday. Drinking and carousing provided brief relief from the pain that racked my mind, body, and soul. Once the music stopped, the anguish resumed with more intensity. The physical and emotional hangovers lasted just long enough to jump back on the merry-go-round of suffering, shameless partying, and feeling sorry for myself. I finally overcame academic failure and forged a new direction.

Although ambition and promise were the new orders of the day, sorrow and pain still paved life’s path. The passing of Mom and sister Patty, job losses, election defeats, political failures, a massive heart attack, a horrific summer on life support, and a decade living with heart failure kept heartache chugging along. Marriage to Sandra, the birth of our girls, professional and some political success, and a heart transplant only served to soothe the ache of sustained suffering.

Since my heart transplant, I’ve developed a fascination with suffering and where it fits in our lives. The emotional and physical pain suffering inflicts on all of us make us naturally want to avoid it at all costs. The Spanish word for fun is diversión. While not a literal translation, the word has the same root as the English diversion. What are we  trying to divert ourselves from? Suffering, of course.

My heart failure and transplant journey have given me a new perspective on suffering and its assortment of so-called remedies. A brief scrolling through social media shows people “living their best lives” on vacation, at parties, and doing all kinds of fun stuff. The question is, Are those activities what life is all about or are they merely short-lived diversions from the daily drudgery of going to work, paying bills, fighting with family, raising kids, doing chores, and on and on?

That question has real life and death meaning for me. Living my best life was working long hours, drinking gallons of beer with a few shots of tequila here and there, and eating gobs  of fatty and unhealthy food. After a decade of heart failure and transplant, those diversions from suffering are no longer available to me if I want to continue living. I had to flip the script. I needed to find a way to live my best life without work, alcohol, food, or elaborate vacations every year, among a host of other temporary feel-good distractions.

I went back to the highbrow intellectual guys to find answers. Taking another page from the Nietzsche playbook, “out of life’s school of war—what doesn’t kill me, makes me stronger.” I’ve endured so much, especially during the past 14 years. Nevertheless, I’m still here. I’m mentally stronger with the character needed to face challenges head on. I have a better outlook on life and look forward to whatever each new day brings.

Nietzsche also told us that “to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.” St. Paul the Apostle gave me a starting point. In his Letter to the Romans, he was trying to unify warring factions of the nascent church in Rome. As in any conflict, the differences in opinion among the groups caused much pain and suffering. St. Paul provided a recommendation to the Romans that has formed the foundation of my hope to flip the script on the never ending cycle of trying to avoid suffering through the pursuit of pleasure.

“Rejoice in your suffering,” St. Paul wrote in Roman 5:3-4, because it ultimately leads to hope. My heart failure journey came to an abrupt and blessed end on April 16, 2020. That’s when a new journey began. Suffering, real and imagined, old and new, continues to endure just as Nietzsche told us. “To live is to suffer.” My post-transplant story is all about rejoicing in my suffering “to find some meaning in it.”

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Note: The story continues next Wednesday.