Life Experiences & Observations

I used the F-word in a Eulogy

On February 18th, 2024 my mom passed away. On February 20th, 2024 I delivered a eulogy at her funeral.

It feels weird to use the word compliment for a eulogy, but for lack of a better way to describe it, I received what felt like an endless number of compliments. I guess that means they were touched by it and felt that it truly captured the essence of my Mom, who I miss very much.

So I have decided to share it here to a broader audience on the internet. Below is what I wrote and said…

I’ve been to many funerals over the last 25 years and have heard and seen plenty of wonderful and touching speeches delivered. I have always been scared shitless to deliver one myself but knew this day would ultimately come. I sure hope I don’t fuck it up.

I apologize for my language but did you really think I was going to eulogize my Mom without including a couple of swear words? These words were always part of her vernacular. While it may have put some people off when my Mom did use foul language I always loved that part of her personality.

I can’t believe I just used the F word at a funeral.

Well my Mom was a very memorable person and so should her eulogy be. You may be offended but I think my Mom would be proud. I promise to try and keep it clean in my speech, from this point forward.

Growing up in Minnesota on Idaho Lane my Mom was always considered one of the cool moms on the block. My friends in the neighborhood frequently gravitated to our house. Probably because she was more lenient than their own parents but also because of how fun she could be. She was a second mother to all of them. They all loved my Mom so much.

My best friend Nate was like my Mom’s third Son. She helped him through the grieving process when Nate’s own mom passed away.

I remember the day we left Minnesota to move to Arizona. There were a ton of people from up and down the block coming to say their goodbyes. Sure some of them came to say goodbye to me but ALL of them came to say goodbye to my Mom. And plenty of tears were shed that day.

Nobody in the state of Minnesota, and anywhere for that matter, will forget her unique phone answering technique. While some have tried to copy it, nobody could replicate her wicked cool answering intonation. I won’t say it out loud but I know you can hear it in your head.

My Mom touched so many people in her life. When I met someone for the first time that my Mom knew, it was remarkable that they all said almost exactly the same thing. “You’re Larry, Charlotte’s son, right? I just love your Mom.”

My Mom wasn’t technically a therapist but she was masterful at giving advice. She was always giving friends and family life advice whether they wanted it or not. Yes she was straightforward and blunt, but she was always clear that the final choice was yours, to take the advice or leave it. Everyone almost always took it because she was almost always right.

Well except for that one time when my wife and I took a break from dating and my Mom told Sharon to move on. Thank God Sharon is just as strong willed as my Mother and never took that piece of advice.

My Mom taught me the importance of finding your dream job. She loved being a realtor. When it came to my work, my Mom was my best cheerleader and biggest supporter. When I chose to take a big risk by pursuing my dream job as a professional poker player, she never had a doubt that I would make it work. She was, however, concerned about my choice and was regularly checking in to ask me how it was going? She was worried but proud. Many people thought my choice was crazy, but my Mom thought it was amazing!

I always called my Mom if I needed someone to talk to or needed some advice. Who am I suppose to call now?

My Mom loved bowling, playing blackjack, reading, and doing puzzles. When her eyesight deteriorated she turned to audio books and it was something she loved to partake in.

My Mom loved Coke and unfortunately cigarettes. While cigarettes most likely contributed to her medical condition, Coke helped sustain her in the last week of life. I guess all of our choices have trade offs.

Every future holiday get together will never be the same. In addition to her fun and playful personality, my Mom was a masterful cook and was always there to prepare the holiday meals. Whether it was for Passover, Hanukkah, Rosh Hashanah, or Thanksgiving she was a staple in the kitchen. And she did her cooking with a ton of zeal.

My Mom was a fighter and I mean in a good way. While at Hospice for a few days, individuals in other rooms were coming in and then leaving to their eternal homes. Whereas my Mom, she just kept breathing. She fought to stay alive a few extra days, despite her pain, so loved ones from out of town, even as far as Israel, could fly in to say their goodbyes. It was a truly touching selfless act of love.

First she waited for Anne, then she waited for Liora, then she waited for Samantha, then she waited for Lyndie & Jaymie, and finally she waited for Kelsey, Brayden, and Mason.

She always said that she was going to work as a Real Estate agent until the day she died. And she pretty much did. Just last week she received a client referral call on her cell phone. I believe it was Wednesday Feb 14th. Unfortunately we had to let the prospect know my Mom was unable to accept her final potential client.

Last night my Wife and I had a discussion about My Mom telling Anne in the hospital, when her talking started to dissipate, that she had a lot to say but not enough energy to say it. I would give almost anything right now to hear all those things that my Mom wanted to say. I think there is a clear lesson here. Don’t delay in telling your friends and loved ones all the important things you have to say. Opportunity can quickly melt away, like cold ice cream, on hot Arizona summer day.

My Mom was so special that even Kurt Cobain came back from his eternal home to be a nursing assistant and provide her with hospice care. I know this is kind of an inside joke for the many who spent time in hospice with my Mom, but I couldn’t resist. Humor helps to heal us. Well his real name was actually Parker not Kurt and I will be eternally grateful for the gentle care he provided to my Mom in her last days of life.

Over the years my mom came to hate the city of Boston, and who can blame her. All of her last few trips there were for funerals. She vowed to never step foot in the city again. When my daughter fell in love with the city of Boston and chose to attend Brandeis University in Waltham Massachusetts I knew a conundrum started to swirl in my Mom’s head. While my Mom can be a stubborn individual at times (I know, big surprise), her caring side always seemed to win in the end. She ultimately told my daughter Samantha that she would break her promise to herself and go to Boston to see her granddaughter graduate college. My heart breaks for the city of Boston, whose reputation with my Mom will never be repaired. And my heart breaks for my daughter Samantha, who will never get to have her Bubbie at her college graduation.

My Mom got to FaceTime with Samantha a couple days before Samantha flew into town. Despite intense pain and decreased energy she found the strength to tell Samantha about all her amazing traits. My Mom made everyone feel special.

I struggle to put into words the strong bond and relationship that my daughter Sophia had with my Mom, her Bubbie. I remember the day Sophia was born and her traumatic entry into the world. Once Sophia was stable and breathing it was my duty to inform the family of Sophia’s birth and what was going on. When I entered the waiting room at the hospital, with many family members eager to hear the news, the shock came over me like a tidal wave, and I couldn’t utter a word. My Mom was the first one to say something. She said… Well?? I then said… “It’s a girl but…” and proceeded to explain the troubling details about her birth and the medical status I had up to that point. At times it can be challenging to talk to Sophia and talk to people about Sophia.

Where are you Sophia? There you are, We all love you!

My Mom knew how to talk to people about Sophia and to Sophia from her first day of life. That’s how truly special my Mom was. And my Mom was super proud of the young woman Sophia has become.

Somehow I talked my Mom into becoming a Bubbie. That’s not an easy role to take on but after 23 years of being a Bubbie it’s obvious to me that the title of Bubbie fit her personality perfectly. Even my cousin Anne, when talking to my Mom in the hospital said “You sound like Bubbie (my Mom’s mom). And you know what my Mom said… “I am a Bubbie!” She ultimately took pride in being a Bubbie.

In general my wife Sharon had a very good relationship with my Mom. That being said, with two very strong willed women having a mother in law/daughter in law relationship, there was bound to be some conflict. They did, however, always find a way to resolve their differences. Even though it wasn’t always easy to see, they grew to love each other. I have to thank my wife Sharon for all she has done for my Mom. I don’t know how my Mom and Dad, would have gotten through these last few weeks without Sharon’s love and support, in too many ways to count.

My Mother In Law Joyce and my Mom became very good friends over the years. Every time Joyce was in town they would find some time to go to lunch just the two of them, and they would talk for hours about anything and everything. I am sure Joyce will miss my Mom just as much as we will. And so will my Mom’s friend Diana. She was at the hospital and hospice more times than I would have ever expected. From challah deliveries to great conversations, it was clear that Diana was one of my Mom’s very close friends. While all of us are grieving, losing one of your best friends has its own unique challenges. My heart goes out to you Diana.

My Mom was always an amazing bridge between my family, my brother’s family, and my father. I pray that the bridge she built remains stable. My Mom kept the bond strong with Jeff, Linda, Matthew, and Andrea… even when times got difficult as hell. She loved them dearly despite our religious differences.

How do I even attempt to describe the relationship my Mom had with my Dad. No words are ever going to do justice to a 62 year commitment of life partnership. They taught me how a lifetime of marriage can endure the best of times and the most troubling of times. They traveled the world together, had kids together, loved each other, partied together, weeped together, battled sometimes with one another, but always made up in the end. Watching the pain my Dad is going through as I read this speech feels like a second wound to my heart. I am always here for you Dad and love you very much.

And then, of course, there’s my Cousin Anne from Iowa. If you don’t know how strong the bond was between Anne and my Mom (Anne’s Aunt Charlotte), imagine Anne having the warrior strength to spend pretty much every waking and sleeping moment with my Mom in her last few days of life. And if that wasn’t enough, she also helped my Mom with her last breath before death. Who has the strength to do that? Well she certainly did and so did my Israeli cousin Liora. They both will forever be my hero’s for giving my mom this indescribable gift.

To my cousin Mollie. The way you have been such a rock through all this medical turmoil is truly incredible. From late nights in the ER with my Mom and Dad, to helping with things around the house, to helping with Sophia so I could spend additional time with my Mom. These last few weeks would have been much more difficult if we didn’t have your help, love, and support. My Mom truly recognized your love and compassionate commitment to her and our family. You were one of the only ones my Mom asked about the one respite day you took for yourself. I know today’s funeral is pulling you away from a potential personal development opportunity. The sacrifices that you have made for my Mom, and our family, is unbelievably altruistic.

I wish I could mention every family member and friend that my Mom had a great relationship with but we would be here all day if I started to go down that path. Just know, all of you out there today, if you had a relationship with my Mom, that relationship meant the world to her. She had the ability to bond with an infinite amount of people.

I’ll finish up with this. There were two pieces of advice my mom would give in difficult times. Her two favorite sayings, from her advice repertoire, were these…

“Life goes on”

and

“This too shall pass”

Sadly… not this time. My heart will forever be torn. I love you Mom!

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September 27, 2021

The Taste and Smell Saga Continues

So in August I ate something that triggered a strong smell and taste which I found very unpleasant. It was a strange occurrence at the time considering since January my taste and smell was almost completely absent. At the time I thought it was an anomaly. Since then, I started to smell that unpleasant odor in everything. Or at least everything that had a hint of that odor. It’s kind of hard to describe. So imagine you smelled a poop like smell. Then imagine only smelling poop even if the food item only had a hint of poop. It would be as if the poop was your entire smell and taste experience. It wasn’t actually poop but you get the gist.

So if the coffee you drink, for instance, has an array of scents but you can only smell the unpleasant one. It would be like drinking a wine with a rainbow of smells and tastes but only picking up one color of that rainbow. Or like a card catalog of smells of which there was only one card you could pull. If that card was not in the card catalog of the food you were eating than there would be no cards at all. Well this is what has been happening to me over the last 7 weeks. To be honest, it has almost been worse than tasting or smelling nothing. Items I loved in the past I no longer could consume because that unpleasant smell was the only smell I could pick up on.

Well all of a sudden… this evening… something changed. I ate a cookie and instead of just tasting sweet, it actually tasted like cookie. All of a sudden I started tasting and smelling a bunch of things. I was an anxious hungry goat. Then it dawned on me. The unpleasant smell I smelt before, started to dissipate this evening. The pieces of the nasal story puzzle were coming together. What if smelling this one unpleasant odor in things was part of the road to nasal nerve recovery. I mean think about it… What is smelling mild unpleasant smells in everything that has even a hint of that smell? It’s like your nose starting to recognize that smell in each food with a touch of it in the flavor profile. Could it really be that the last 7 weeks of smelling something bad in a bunch of things was actually the start of being able to taste and smell everything? I am still in the discovery stage of smelling and tasting but things seem promising. While some additional recovery will likely need to occur, something is definitely happening. I am starting to get excited to smell the world again but I am trying not to let my emotions get too far ahead of me. Going through this as long as I have, I still have to believe it will be a process rather than a single point in time.

I’m sorry if this blog is poorly written but my experience is not easy to describe. I did, however, want to at least capture it. Even if it was a disjointed capture.

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April 17, 2021

Almost 3 Months with No Taste or Smell

On January 23rd of 2021 I was diagnosed with Covid-19. Before I continue I want to say my heart goes out to all the families who lost a friend or relative because of Covid-19. I am lucky to say that I survived with very mild symptoms. About a week after testing positive I lost my sense of taste and smell. While my wife and two kids also had Covid they never lost their senses like I did.

At first, losing my sense of taste and smell was a mild annoyance. I found a whole new understanding of the idea of eating solely to survive. But as the days and weeks started to accumulate eating with no taste became rather depressing. As I watched my family eat and savor food I was yearning inside to get back to life where eating was pleasurable. At times, I would make something or get ready to order something and and forget until it was in front of me that I wasn’t going to enjoy it. One example was ordering a glass of wine at a restaurant when my wife and I went out to dinner for our anniversary. I ordered the wine varietal the matched what I knew I liked best and looked forward to trying it. Then when it came, I went to smell the nose of the wine and nothing. I thought I was going to be able to enjoy it and then remembered that I would not be able to. I did drink it but we kind of laughed when we realized that choosing the cheapest wine on the menu would have been the most logical approach considering my condition. We have had other laughs at home about my smell challenges. Like no longer minding when my daughter makes tuna fish for dinner. Prior to my nose issues, the smell of tuna caused me to feel that slight taste of virtual vomit in the depths of my throat. But now, no problem whatsoever.

So here I type this on April 17th and I am still grappling with my loss of taste and smell. Every time I think it is starting to return I realize it really is not. I can sort of smell things if I get my nose really close and sniff deeply. I’m like a cocaine addict trying with all my might to sniff up the food aromas. I’ve come to the point where imagining taste and smell is the closest I get to actually tasting and smelling. When I eat chocolate I imagine what I know it smells like. When I drink a beer I imagine what it tastes like. My enjoyment while eating exclusively comes from tongue sensations. Sweet, sour, spicy, savory, etc. It’s these things that are almost heightened since my taste buds work but my olfactory nerve does not. And its not just this. Without getting too graphic I can feel there is something wrong with my nose. It feels permanently inflamed like somebody is continually blowing a hair dryer up my nostrils. It’s like a hot, barren, wide open desert inside there.

I don’t mean to complain as I know many people have been severely impacted by Covid from extreme sickness to death. But I excessively yearn for my taste and smell to return. I continue to do smell therapy and yes that’s a thing. I regularly smell foods at very close range and imagine what they smell like. From my research I have learned that this is supposed to accelerate the process of olfactory nerve repair. It’s like training your brain and nose to meet up again. To be those old friends reuniting and kindling once again that relationship. Sometimes I think it is working and other times I think its a lost cause. At times I kind of wish I had a weight problem as this would have been a wonderfully effective, medically induced solution. Instead I just do my best to enjoy what I can. Like the crunch of a chip or the melting feeling of ice cream on my tongue. Or the salty taste (well not actually taste) of an olive. I can tell when something is salty even though I guess technically I am not tasting the salt. It’s my tongue recognizing the saltiness.

So here I am, ticking the days off my calendar as I do my best to patiently wait for my taste and smell to return. Until then, I will just continue eating to survive.

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September 18, 2020

The Poem I almost Didn’t Publish – Covid Thoughts and Other Societal Ills.

A Poem fart jumps out of my pen,
fumes putrid to some but butterly prints to others

A world scoured with pain as I rummage through the internet
hoping to capture a modicum of warm cozy news.

Poker in an electronic hand held box shields me from the worst of what society plans to tattoo on my brain.

Financial markets swing back and forth, one day impending doom, the next day a cataclysmic orgasm.

Every last member of society seems to be blind to the country’s fresh and new skin being born under society’s enormous nasty scab.

I’m protected by my own little dream bubble that somehow allows me to spend most days exactly as I want. Minus in-person interactions and excursions with various humanoids I adore.

My immediate family gets more of me physically but not as much mentally. I guess these are the inevitable chains of a philosophical brain volcano.

Thoughts continuously erupting, small embers of the past and fiery ideas of the future. The best and worst of emotions under control by the wonders of modern day pharmacology.

Oh how I long to get back on the meditation train, so I can revolve around on the circular track of the present moment.

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September 4, 2020

Social Media is a Gift

I know what you must be thinking after reading my title. What the hell is wrong with this dude. I think he needs some serious psychiatric help. Hell… Twitter is a virtual cesspool, Facebook a Fake News manifesto, and Instagram is a political megaphone blaring louder than ACDC’s Thunderstruck.

Well here is my take. You are looking at the soil that is nurshing the poisonous weeds, and I am looking at the tall oak trees that provide oxygen to our world. When you get right down to it, perspective is everything.

So here is where the gift comes in. Follow along. How much do you know about your great grandmother? Do you know her name? Do you know where she spent most of her life? Do you know what she did on most days? Do you know where she liked to go on vacation? What about how she celebrated her 40th birthday. What about how she celebrated her 25th wedding anniversary? Did you know she once got a letter from Betty Crocker saying her recipe was going to be in published in their next cookbook? Yes, I just made that last one up to prove a point. I would guess that you know almost none of these items. If you are lucky, you may know one or two of them. I would love to have all these details about my great grandmother, but I unfortunately don’t.

Well guess what?!? If you embrace the gift of social media, and use it for what I believe is its intended purpose, your great grandchildren will have all these details and more about you. And that is the gift of social media. It can serve to document your personal history for your great grandchildren, and even their great grandchildren. Social media is a perma scrapbook, persistent in the cloud, for as long as you would like it to remain there. It can even play like a movie of your life if you decide to post vlogs on a platform like YouTube. Sure there are two sides to every coin and there are plenty of bad things about social media. And yes there are risks to putting everything out there for many to see. But that is smelly, negative dog piss, that I won’t talk about here.

This is your opportunity to utilize Social Media as the gift it can be. Something much more important, special, and wholesome than people portray it to be. It’s the infinite gift you can give to your future relatives. The next time you are doing your daily scrolling through Facebook, with verbal needles being thrown in your eyes, and your blood starting to bubble by reading about your political enemies… keep things in perspective. Social Media can be a Gift or a Shit Bomb. It’s up to you decide which you wish it to be.

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July 25, 2020

How Has It Been This Long

too long I see the date of my last blog post and can’t believe it. While this is not my only blog, this is the one where I can write whatever I want with no theme chaining me down to the screen. But hey, I got a pretty good excuse. I chased down my dream and I have been living it out for the last two years. Sure it hasn’t been all warm blankets and teddy bears, but it sure ain’t the cubicle hell of corporate America. For many that safety is more comfortable but for me it was time to move on. Risk finally outweighed comfort and I took my shot.

I guess technically many cubicles have disappeared with Covid-19 and a large part of America now working from home. I won’t even get started with the all the pain that is happening in the world. Let’s just say I know it is out there, and definitely important, but the last thing we need is one more opinion splattered onto the internet walls. There is already a mess, way too large, of virtual graffiti.

I’m not going to type long but I just wanted to get this long lost rabbit out of it’s deep dark hat. Hopefully I won’t just say more to come but there actually WILL be more to come. Does a blog post even exist if it is never read? Frankly, I just don’t give a damn. Here it is!

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September 7, 2017

Sabbatical Countdown

I am lucky enough to work for a company that gives their employees a month off paid every 5 years. Upcoming next month is my 4th sabbatical which means I have been with my company 20 years. I have some cool plans ahead but for now I am just in countdown mode. Like a space shuttle’s engines charging for launch I can’t help but be extremely excited about the upcoming lift off.

Since I currently work a 3 by 12 night shift and have a few vacation days this month, the number of work days remaining before for sabbatical is dwindling (in a good way) quickly. Just 12 work days, or I should say work nights, until sabbatical. Once it gets even closer, I will post a blog with a list of items I hope to embark on to make my time off exciting. That will help ensure I get a least a few of them done.

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August 23, 2017

Yes, I Chose Sleep Over the Eclipse

eclipse As you all know, there was tons of hype in regards to the eclipse that occurred on Monday. Yes, ideally I would have liked to have watched it live myself. But at the end of the day, I chose my eyelid eclipse over the actual eclipse. I also figured the video and pictures professionals would capture would be much better than my own. And I was spot on.

I think if I lived in the path of totality I might have been much more inclined to loose some sleep to watch it live. But not being in that path, not having glasses to truly look up and watch it, and not being enthused about the dullness of experiencing it through a pin hole camera… I chose sleep. Boy do I feel rested and my retinas are totally in tact.

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June 21, 2017

My World Series of Poker Heartbreak!

Larry WSOP Last week I was in Las Vegas for the World Series of Poker (WSOP). I had my sights on a WSOP cash. It’s something I have never done before and it’s first on my poker Bucket List. My plan was to play and cash in Event #25, the $1,000 buy-in Pot Limit Omaha (PLO) event. I won’t go deep into the intricacies of the game but it plays similar to Hold Em except you get 4 cards rather than 2, must but can only use 2 cards from your hand, and can only bet up to the amount in the pot.

I have played a lot of Hold Em over the last 15 years but over the last 3 years I have started to really enjoy learning and growing at PLO. I have a very solid grasp of cash game strategy but this would only be my second PLO tournament I have ever played. Last year I played in the $565 buy in PLO WSOP event.

So last Tuesday was the day. It’s always really exciting sitting down to start a new tournament with a full stack and a pristine uncracked dream. Especially when its at the WSOP, one of the biggest stages in poker.

The event was exhilarating especially when I tripled up to 15k in chips somewhere around the 4th level of the tourney. I ran it up even more to the point of having almost 40k in chips. Then about 30 minutes before the dinner break, during level 6, the green felt sharks began to swirl. Poker pros with obviously more PLO tournament experience than myself started to lean heavily with aggression on those who were trying to protect rather than grow their stacks. See, in tournament poker, the forced bets called the blinds go up every round. In this tournament, the rounds are 1 hour. We were on level 6 when my game started to unravel. After call/folding or raise/folding on about 4 hands in 30 minutes, my stack went from about 40k to 17k. Luckily, the dinner break came along and threw me a life preserver.

At the dinner break, I did some soul searching and realized clearly what was happening. I was playing too tight and trying too hard to protect my stack just to make the money. I grabbed some food, headed up to my room, and spent the next hour watching PLO tournament instructional videos while getting some well needed stomach fuel.

After the dinner break it was on to level 7. No more getting pushed around. I had made the decision that I was going to find my spot with good equity to double up. I found that spot when my A-Q-10-5 hand with 2 diamonds flopped top pair with a flush draw. To make the long story short, I bet, he raised, I pushed all in, he called, and I proceeded to lose the hand. That’s the bad news. The good news is that I had 60% equity to win the hand and rather than continuing to let myself be pushed around I took a stand at the correct mathematical moment. Unfortunately, cashing this tournament was not meant to be.

In tournament poker, if you get all your chips in with the the best chance of winning, that is all you can ask for. Over the short run, luck may trip you up, but over the long haul good decisions with good equity will always prevail.

While I was certainly heartbroken that I didn’t cash the tourney, I felt proud of how I much I learned and how quickly I was able to adjust on the fly. I feel like I grew enough to be much better prepared come next year. While it’s very early, I can’t help but start counting down the days until next year’s World Series of Poker. Until then, it’s time to fertilize my bankroll in the next 6 weeks leading up to the Arizona State Poker Championship tournament. Deal me in!!

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