It is Palm Sunday 1992 and I am coming to the eleven mile mark in a race. It is a Penn Relay event run from the stadium at Franklin Field out to the river, along the West River drive and back. As I turn into 33rd street with but a mile to go, the fatigue is beginning to get to me . . . just up this grade and we’ll see the stadium. Up we go and there it is “Franklin Field.” It was all down hill from there to the south entrance of the stadium. The 20 K (12.4. miles) Penn Relay Classic was about to end for me.
Into the South entrance I go and I notice a man standing in front of a microphone going through a list of names, apparently the numbers of the runners. For me it is just a glance and, down the track I go, one more turn, up the straightway to the finish line in front of the North Stands. I thought . . . mmmm . . . it was only yesterday I turned that corner of the track and headed up to the finish line in first place in a mile run for West Catholic H.S. in the City Title meet with Central H.S. I was a winner and so was West. I suppose I am a little slower today but . . . at last there is the finish line and then I heard the stadium loud speakers boom, “Now finishing is Paul McSorley, age 62!”
When I finished in that mile they did announce I was the winner but some how they failed to mention my age. But believe me I felt more like a winner today than that June day in l947 . . . just 45 years ago! I also recall fondly that on that day in ‘47 my Dad was sitting in the stands. The one and only time he saw me run. On another occassion I crossed that finish line with some one in the stands and that was in 1980 when I finished the Penn Relay Marathon there. In the stands was June cheering me on . . . we have a picture with me finishing and you can see June standing in the backgound . . . cheering me on!
This has been a week of memories. Paul Allen’s death brought back memories of my Father as I heard Jim and Frank eulogize their Dad. Both were touching and well done – especially in their ability to intersperse humor with their loving sentiments. This was on April 6. The day before, John’s second anniversary. Then on April ll, Robbie Bugey was married to a young lawyer, Charles Curley, and once again there was talk of fathers and grandfathers, since Robbie is Win and Paul’s granddaughter.
I sat talking with Frank Allen about his granddad lawyer and reminded him of his (granddad) sometime overbearing interest in one grandchild, namely, his brother Jim. He did recall with some humor how Jim even got to travel to Grandpop’s office. I then told him about a comment I heard his grand dad say one day as he wearily departed the office . . . “I’m going home to look into the face of a child!” I can empathise with him now and feel the contentment he felt in just doing that . . . the relief from the quarrels of the law and the people in it.
Death of a love one, friend, and the like are certainly trenchant reminder of our own mortality. Not a very acute or brillant observation, but at 62 it has a meaning that is never trivial. It permeates in a large respect every thing you do or not do . . . at least when you sit down and put your thoughts on paper.
I remember the last time I saw my Dad. It was on the morning he died March 14,1972 (a mere 20 years ago). I had to pick him up at St Cecilia’s after he attended all the masses . . . I had taken him there around 6 AM and returning around 8:30. In the meantime I had gone for a run (what else?). This taking him and bringing him back from Church was not something I did with much relish. I did not do it often. Katherine, who had approved of the idea, did it most of the time. But on this morn, due to weariness or whatever I was volunteered. And so by fate I was his chauffer on the last day of his life.
I remember discussing the forthcoming weekend . . . March 19 particularly, since I was running a marathon in Central Park, N.Y. . . . in preparation for my first Boston on April 17, 1972. He wasn’t too keen about the merits of my endeavor, although he believe in the benefits of exercise. He often walked from our home in West Philly (41st & Baltimore Ave) to his office at Broad and Chestnut Sts.
He often, during this period, referred to how tired he was . . . physically and mentally and was ready to meet his maker. We had many outbursts about his conduct in my house and as only a father and son might do we did a bit of shouting as to who was going to do what to whom. It often disturbed Katherine or at least appeared to do so. She, would never have raised her voice to her father, but with us it was all bluster and flurry with no real menace. We managed to do the same when I was his “employee” at the office. It was said! It was out! It was over! . . . Now let’s get back to living.
That was his last morning. I was not to see him until the following day at the funeral parlor. He had fought the good fight and had not resisted. We always had a problem in communication. It was not the thing to do in his day. He was 42 when I was born and had a good 10 or 11 mouths to feed. It was not suprising that we didn’t pal around together. I learned from others, my mother other lawyers, etc., that he was really proud that I became a lawyer. Even while he was in the office from the years ‘58 to ‘66 he never said . . . Hey! way to go!• Yet I did know that he liked my enthusiasm, as I do now seeing Rich McSorley and Joe Lukens approaching the Bar, but in those years he was nearing 80 and enthusiasm for the law was difficult to muster.