The passing of Ted Kennedy…. August 26, 2009

Like many of you I heard about the death of Ted Kennedy  first thing  this morning….I felt…not surprise, certainly, with terminal brain cancer it was amazing he lived as long as he did….a testimony to his will to live. And what a life that man has lived…no matter how you feel about his politics…he had a grand, glorious, sorrow-filled, marred and privileged existence.

Born to great wealth and what would become America’s “royal family”, he was the younger brother who lived to see his older brothers both murdered in the most public fashion. He had to grieve in public. He was Uncle and father figure to his many nieces and nephews who lost their Dads. He dealt with alcohol problems, the cancer of his son who lost a leg to it, a tragic blunder that ended his presidential hopes(and a young woman’s life), the death of beloved nephews to drugs, plane crashes and skiing accidents, his wife’s alcohol problems, divorce, and lived through it all to still become one of the most influential U.S. Senators in history. As an email that just popped into my mailbox said…he was indeed larger than life.

He did not live to see his lifelong passion become realized…health insurance for all Americans…but no matter what happens with it, he will be missed, by people on both sides of the aisle. One of a kind.