Boston College Eagle One-Card (1993)

I remember the day I got this BC ID. I was a sophomore, and it was quite a different situation from when I got my ID as a freshman. That year, I was about to start my last round of chemo and I barely looked like myself. When I was getting my picture taken for this ID, my hair had grown back and I had been finished with treatment for an entire year. Still, I was in the middle of a self-medicating treatment that I would struggle with until the end of my junior year. Instead of chemo, I was poisoning myself with alcohol. So much so, that I didn’t care if I lived or died. More about that tomorrow…

Boston College Football Tickets, Part 1

On Saturday, September 5^th, 1992, the Boston College Football Team was playing Rutgers at Alumni Stadium. It was their first game of the season, and the first game of my freshman year at BC. I had tickets to the game (which The Eagles went on to win 37-20), but I could only watch it on TV because I was at UMass in Worcester getting my last round of chemotherapy. I was kind of bummed that I couldn’t go, but I could tell I was close to declaring victory over my cancerous brain tumor. And I was right.

BC may have lost their home opener today, and I didn’t have to watch it from a hospital bed. Still, I’m betting somewhere today there is a college student who missed going to a football game because of cancer. To all those college students who missed out today because they were getting chemo or some other cancer treatment, hang in there. I finished my battle 19 years ago this weekend, and have been cancer free ever since.

Just keep doing what you love, laughing, and thinking positively. Before you know it, you will be going to those games and cheering your school on.

Go Eagles!

Rest of My College Door Stuff (Leary, Star Wars, Coke, Parental Advisory, Letterman, Cheers, Gaston, Extreme, Red Sox, MST3K, Jack Nicholson)

In addition to all this other stuff, this scan completes all of the things that were up on my college door during my freshman and sophomore years.

Denis Leary was my hero then, and most likely always will be – just as Star Wars will be my favorite movie.

Coke was my favorite drink back then, but I’d have to say that’s been replaced by Powerade Zero Grape (which is made by Coke).

I guess the parental advisory sticker was a warning to people who entered that they would probably be hearing swears coming from me or a CD I was playing.

Even though I don’t watch Letterman and Cheers as much as I did back then, they still remain at the top of my all-time TV favorites list.

I wasn’t a big fan of Beauty and the Beast, but I think I wanted to be more like the manly, “bad boy” Gaston. Speaking of Beauty and the Beast, this video is hilarious.

Part of my lifelong plan is to keep buying tickets to see Extreme and the Red Sox as long as both groups are together.

If you’ve never seen Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K), I highly recommend checking it out.

And Jack is just Jack – although I don’t think you should lie to anyone.

Quotes from My College Door (1992-1994)

Along with Clavin and Hobbes, Deep Thoughts, The Far Side, Eddie Vedder, and Cam Neely; I had these quotes up on my college room door. Not sure if Aerosmith came up with that quote, but that’s where I heard it. Enjoy…

Letter from Patrick (5/19/94)

So, back in the early 90s, we didn’t have the internet to stay in touch with our college classmates during the summer. We made the occasional expensive long distance phone call, but mostly we wrote letters. I kept just about all of them (like this one from my friend Tim), and still get a kick out of reading them 17 years later. This one is from my best bud Patrick who still wrote to me after dealing directly with my drinking problem for our entire sophomore year.

I love how he 1) started off the letter by mockingly rooting for a NY team 2) referred to a future Bruins-Sharks Stanley Cup match up 3) called the Maple Leafs the “maple queefs” 4) refers to females as “biatches” 5) wrote “Go Vancouver!” on the envelope

Thanks for hanging in there Patrick - you rocked then and you’re rockin’ now!

Eddie Vedder and Indifference Lyrics

This was one of the many things I had up on my door in college. Indifference is one of my favorite Pearl Jam songs, and I identify with this line in particular when it comes to never giving up…

To see more things I had up on my door in college, you can go here, here, here, here, and here.

Holy Cross Graduation Invitation (2011)

In case you missed it, last year I wore a different t-shirt each day and wrote about it. The reason I was able to make it the whole year with a different tee each day was the kind donations from people in my life. Included in those people was a group of students from Holy Cross who are part of the SPUD program that come to visit Hope Lodge every Thursday night (you can take a look at all of those t-shirts here, here, here, here, here, and here).

But these students do more than just give me t-shirts. They talk and laugh with the Hope Lodge guests, play games with them, and help decorate, clean, and organize whenever the Lodge needs it.

Every year it’s hard for me to say goodbye to the seniors, and this year I think will be even more so because the group’s leader has been coming to Hope Lodge for three years. So, I thought since HC didn’t ask me to speak at graduation I’d try to share some words of wisdom with the outgoing SPUD/HC seniors...

1. Don’t panic if you don’t have a job lined up yet – and if you don’t, being a counselor at a summer camp is a good way to get out of your parents’ house for a few months
2. It’s okay to stay in “College Party Mode” for 5 years, but when you get into your upper 20s, drinking too much loses its coolness quickly
3. Always remember that if you have people in your life that love you, you have enough
4. It gets easier going to visit campus post-graduation, but that first time will sting
5. Jesuit Volunteers might also be a good choice if the job thing is stressing you out too much
6. The past four years in college have not determined the rest of your life – you can still be/do whatever you want to if you put your mind to it
7. Each year really does go by faster as you get older (sorry)
8. Budgeting your money is a good thing
9. When you get your first job, be ready to work with someone that you don’t get along too well with (it’s bound to happen eventually)
10. Everything really does happen for a reason
11. It’s still really easy to laugh and have fun after college
12. The only person’s opinion about you that really matters is your own

Letter from My Friend Andy (2/2/97)

When I tell people about him, the easiest way to describe my friend Andy is by saying whatever I can do, Andy can do better. And I’m not just saying it to be nice or to talk myself down. It’s just true. He is smarter than me, can play guitar better than me, and can play hockey better than me. He also is one of the few people I know who can go toe-to-toe with me as far as life experience/challenges. He is also one of the funniest, kindest people you will ever meet.

When I was in the hospital with cancer, Andy would run up from his crew practice on Lake Quinsigamond and come to visit me. When we were in college (Andy went to Harvard), he saw me at my drunken worst, listened to me when I drunk dialed, and was always supportive. After we graduated college, Andy was often away conducting his own studies in the rain forests of Indonesia. In 1997, emailing from the forest wasn’t an option, so Andy and I kept in touch by writing letters and sending packages.

Here’s the beginning of one Andy sent me in February of 1997, with a funny “Have You Ever Done This?” list Andy made to update me on what had been happening on his end

(Notice #8 in the list - It refers to the first job I got after college…I had obviously told him about it in my last letter). Well, I guess Malaria isn’t that funny… Anyway, enjoy!

Thanks for all the laughs, letters, support, hockey games, and fun times, Andy! Miss you and love you!