Last night Kathy and I spent the evening with Playford and Kathy Thorson – first enjoying some delicious homemade pizza (complete with hand-pressed crusts)  and then a rousing game of Trivial Pursuit.  It was good to be together – and good to be reminded as well that Playford remains an incredibly vibrant person despite the ravages of ALS.  To be in the presence of someone who can no longer hold his head up,  no longer speak, no longer swallow, no longer scratch his nose – but who still can and does laugh and smile – is to be the presence of True Greatness.   Playford is my Hero. . . and so is his wife, Kathy.  As she said in the radio interview I did with her recently,  they are doing the best they can with the cards they have been dealt – finding joy and meaning wherever and whenever they can – and my wife and I marvel at how well they are managing to do just that.   It was great to be with them – and great to have what in some ways was a relatively normal evening, much as we might have had five or ten or fifteen years ago.  There is a big difference, of course, in Playford’s condition – but he is still Playford, and that’s maybe Lesson #1 in all of this.  This horrific disease has taken so much away- but not his heart and soul.   That is still there in spades.

When it came time to split into teams for T.P., we left it up to Playford – whether we would go couple vs. couple or men vs. women.  I don’t remember how he conveyed his vote, but Playford opted for the war between the sexes, and in a hard-fought match we prevailed by I believe a score of 6 pie pieces to 4.   Playford no longer speaks, but he communicates via an amazing device in which he moves a cursor across a computer screen keyboard by moving his head – and is able to spell out words. . . which the computer will also vocalize if Playford so chooses.   And so he was my partner in every way.  He didn’t know every answer – and in those relatively rare cases, he would type NC, which was short for No Clue.  (He typed out the full words the first time around.)   But most of the time he was right there on the ball, and I’m especially glad that he knew how many major league teams Carl Yastremksi (I’m spelling that wrong) played for.   (The answer is “one.”)

Playford may be my hero,  but I certainly objected to the offensive blanket which he wore through most of the evening- boasting purple and gold colors and the emblem of a certain NFL team that plays in the Twin Cities-  and which lost today to the Packers.   We gave him plenty of grief about that, although had we known how today’s game was going to turn out, we might have been gentler about his taste in blankets.

Packer-Viking conflicts aside, it was a night of friendship- and especially of celebrating how friendship becomes even more precious and vivid against this kind of backdrop.   When life piles losses upon losses upon losses, the blessings that remain are finer than gold.