November 17, 2006

Good job, very interesting to read. However, don't you think it's a little over board to say "the easy-going world around me slowly started to disappear."? 

I was taking a graduate of the program I direct out to lunch and was listening to ESPN Radio on the way to the restaurant. At approximately 11:45 a.m. Colin Cowherd told me that Bo had entered the eternal big house. I could feel my body tense then sag and found it very hard to normally breathe. You can presume someones passing but you are never able to anticipate the loss and feeling of remorse you feel when a giant succumbs and leaves your world much smaller. I thought of poor Don Shane and how he must have felt since Bo had his last cardiac event at the WXYZ studio where he was going to film the Big Ten Ticket show.

I don't hold the news I received from Cowherd against him but I found it ironic that a pedestrian radio show host who had repeated for years that Michgan was no longer on college football's stage of major programs told me that the man who put us there was no longer with us. The simplest contradictions in life are always the most confounding.

That day, I was packing for the MMB trip to Columbus.  We were supposed to be bussing down that afternoon, and I was just finishing up before walking down to get there with plenty of time.  Had the TV on in my house and a Ufer recording on my stereo system, just getting amped up and trying to find all my stuff.  Then I noticed the scrolling headline on the TV that he had the heart attack, and then a few minutes, that he had died.  My parents called me, they're both alums and went to school during the 10-Year War, and it was just impossible to process what was happening.

A few minutes later, I had to be on my way down to Revelli.  That was one of the longest, strangest walks I can remember.  It was like I had been punched in the gut on what should have been one of the best days ever.  Walking into Revelli, everyone just had the same vacant stare on their face.  Funeral-esque.  No one knew what to do.  Everything that happened that day, on Saturday, and even the week after, it was like dealing with losing a family member.  And being in the MMB, I was in the middle of it all.  It's something I'll never forget.

I had the opportunity to be around Bo a bunch of times over the years, from when I was a kid and he was still coach, to all the way up to about a week before he died, when he was sitting a couple rows in front of us at a performance at the Power Center.  He didn't look good, it was the first time I'd ever seen him truly frail, but he was still completely engaged, and was perfectly friendly to everyone who approached him to say hi.  It was little snippets of totally vintage Bo.  He liked being around people, and people liked being around him.  I sure did.  

Anyways, this has kind of turned into a microcosm of that week.  A little nonsensical, a little rambling, and not really close to getting closure on how I feel about the fact that Bo isn't around anymore.  Yet I think we've all come back.  We went through the void, but we've found our center again as a university and as a football program.  Things feel right again.  And that's good.

I was flying into Detroit that morning.  When we landed, but were still on the plane, my wife called her father to arrange our airport pick-up.  She hung up the phone and said, "Bo just died."  What I'll always remember were the gasps of the people nearby and the murmu that went through that plane.  I still get shivers recalling it. 

I graduated in 2005 and by Fall of 2006 was working in NJ, a job that I did not have to be at until 1pm.  I remember getting ready in the morning and seeing the news on ESPN.  I stopped getting ready and just stood there, staring blankely into nothingness. 

I grew up a Michigan fan as both of my parents are Michigan alums as well, having attended Michigan from 1968-1974 (graduate school included).  My dad was there when Bo was hired.  I grew up watching Michigan on TV, seeing Bo on the sidelines before he retired when I was 6 years old.  Bo gave a speech at my graduation in 2005, something I will always remember. 

I called my dad, knowing that he does not watch much TV or check internet news sites to inform him of the news.  There was a silence from both ends of the phone.  I have seen my dad cry exactly one time in my life, the day his mother was diagnosed with cancer (his father passed away prior to my birth so if he cried then, I didn't see it).  While I was on the phone and could not see my dad,  this was the 2nd time I heard him cry. 

The Michigan family lost a leader and a father/grandfather that day.  But Bo lives on in each of us, in Ann Arbor, and in the University of Michigan. 

From cmu with my roommate, also a michigan fan and from my same hometown. We were coming home to watch the game with our friends and family back home. Then my roommate from the year before called me and told me. Almost started crying right then and there. At this point, I had been watching Michigan for about a decade and bo had become a grandfather figure to one of my lifes most cherished establishments. I still think about him every so often. Still have my copy of bo's lasting lessons in my collection. Read it if you haven't.

I called the wife and told her, then went back to work I only stayed there for an hour or so then went home sat down and wept for the rest of the day. The only other time I shed tears for Michigan Football was the day Bo retired.

He was like a father figure in my life and although I was not connected to him in any way he was a great influence on my life, the message he delivered up until the day he died was one that can inspire people to accomplish things that they could have never concieved as possible.

Bo was able to walk with Kings without losing the common touch, that is truly what made him a legend to me.