[ConorMacNessa]

What a story, ML! It's amazing the way that that barber touched you in a way that you could never have expected.

It puts me in mind of a quote from a very famous movie uttered by an Angel-in-Training:

"Strange, isn't it? Each man's life touches so many other lives. When he isn't around he leaves an awful hole, doesn't he?"

You never know the paths others have taken or the travails others have endured when you first encounter them.

When I was stationed at the Naval Hospital in Quantico, VA, I met a Marine Officer, Major Rick Spooner, who was ready to retire and opened a restaurant in Q-town. I was a regular patron from its inception and with my fellow Corpsman, Doc John Lesko, shut the place down on many a night. I knew then that he was great Marine and Officer, as well as a consummate gentleman, and with his the help of his wife, an urbane and genial host.

His restaurant prospered and became famous among Marines and others, including FBI Agents, whose training school is located at Quantico. It is the famous Globe & Laurel, featured in the novels of Patricia Cornwell. It has moved twice and is now a magnificent establishment near the South Gate to MCB Quantico. When I took my son John Man to visit the Marine Corps Museum last year and introduced him to the Major, over forty years since I first met the Major, I learned that sixty years ago he was captured by the Japanese and spent several years as a Prisoner of War. I don't have to tell you what kind of conditions he endured, as did many of our "Greatest Generation."

God Bless him and God Bless them all!



"Riamh nár dhruid ó sbairn lann!"

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[left that other site]

indeed...God Bless Them. They are becoming fewer, as their ranks are thinning.

I grew up in a Jewish neighborhood in Boston, Complete with Kosher butchers, synagogues on every corner, and a local Yiddish newspaper.

There was another barber on Blue Hill Av, too. He was Leonard Nimoy’s dad. Leonard attended the Orthodox Synagogue Mishkin T’fillah, which practiced the Priestly Blessing at Rosh Hashanah. Leonard, who was not yet Bar Mitzvah, was not supposed to look at the Cohan’s HANDS. But he sneaked a peek, and the gesture turned into the Vulcan Salute, many years later.

I worked in a kosher nursing home, and Leonard would come and visit a family friend there on occasion. And William Shatner’s wife (the one that died), went to high school with my sister. She was gorgeous.

So you are right about lives touching.

Live long and prosper.