I have the proud distinction of being named after my father. His identity is my identity. My story is rooted in his story. When he got sick a surgeon cut him open and then sewed him right back up - Pancreatic cancer. There was nothing they could do for him. He was allergic to morphine, so he just gutted out the pain. Kids couldn’t go into hospital rooms in those days, so my brother Bob and I would peer through the metal blinds at the window of his ground-level room and watch while my mom visited with him. In eight weeks he was dead. He died as he had lived – still fighting to get back up until the last count.