Magnificent!

"The greater the artist, the greater the doubt.

Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize." Robert Hughes

Say what?

I listened again as my co-worker and lunch companion, Gene, repeated this quote upon request.

Greater?  Less? Which one was it and, more importantly, how did it relate to my fears about a presentation which I mentioned in an offhanded way? This type of exchange long ago became the fodder of our brief hour together at a Glenside deli.  It was one of dozens we would spend digging around for the whys and wherefores, or as Gene would say it, the "puts and takes" of life's foibles.



Eugene P. Simonson

Fast forward 30 years and, once again, Gene reminds me of the above noted and long forgotten phrase.  He pitches this to me as I explain my newest fear of an uncertain career change.  Our conversation is rich and invigorating, as always.  Gene is like an infantryman when it comes to any dialogue - he comes prepared to dig in and face whatever verbal artillery is fired.  He is fueled by discussion and ably dispenses ideas, little known facts, and well thought out lessons with precision.  He is a fearless "go to" guy.

What makes this fairly recent conversation more poignant is the fact that Gene begins with a battering ram of personal news - he is fighting stomach cancer.  As he knowingly says with a hint of resignation, "You only get one stomach."  Our talk starts with his health and moves from the space of "what" to the deliciously exposed level of "why" and "how" we feel about things.  Gene just cannot help himself with his bottomless sense of wonder - it is the spark to our friendship that has burned for almost three decades.

On June 7, 2011 that spark extinguished in this world when Gene died.

I hate typing that weighted sentence.  Yet, I am gratefully buoyed by Gene's reply to his son Patrick's question, posed days before his death. Patrick, the eldest of five Simonson children, asked his dad for a word that best described his life of almost 79 years.  My friend, who consistently respected a well chosen word, replied, "Magnificent."

This one-word review is the perfect consolation prize for those of us who were lucky enough to be touched by the momentum of Gene's orbit.  We supped at the banquet of his ferocious appetite for life, even as life's menu held many unanswerable challenges. At the dessert course of his life, Gene's singular critique is a sweet niblet of comfort that resonates beyond measure. 

Gene equally loved life's flavor filled joys with its merciless disappointments because he respected and appreciated a challenge.  The more life stung, the more it motivated him to understand it or create alternatives to deal with a course correction.  He savored it all because he valued honest effort of any kind. 

Gene's enemies were ideas or actions that were not fully fleshed out.  He was confounded when people did not seek to correct a wrong or push to completion.  He struggled to understand why stumbling around in the dark is a sometimes temporary, but often regular, course of action for some of us.  Gene lived in the light because the dark held no purpose for his sensibilities.  I believe this luminous clarity is why people sought him out.  It sure is one reason why I was happily on the receiving end of his friendship.

 In her remarks of remembrance about her dad at the end of his funeral Mass, Gene's youngest child and only daughter, Eileen, shared her idea of why her father's time here ended - his curiosity got the best of him. It is the finest and most plausible explanation yet. Gene's curiosity was limitless.  Eileen's pinpoint observation brought it all into focus for us at St. Luke the Evangelist Church last Saturday.

And here's one more poignant fact that can be understood only as the universe operating as it should: Gene's wife of over 50 years is named Regina. Gene and Jean.  It is syncopation personified.

Jean will travel life using her singular metronome for now.  She is fully equipped for this challenge.  She and Patrick, Tom, Mark, Tim, and Eileen along with their respective families will carry this tempo set by the maestro over the course of their lives.  I am humbled by and grateful for their collective effort to keep playing the music that was the symphony of Gene's magnificent life.

The Little Ship

I stood watching as the little ship sailed out to sea. The setting sun tinted his white sails with a golden light, and as he disappeared from sight a voice at my side whispered,

“He is gone."

But the sea was a narrow one.
On the farther shore a little band of friends had gathered to watch and wait in happy expectation. Suddenly they caught sight of the tiny sail and, at the very moment when my companion had whispered, “He is gone” a glad shout went up in joyous welcome,

“Here he comes!”