This week....

Well I can finally write about it without totally breaking down, so here goes. Art passed away on Saturday morning at around 830 am. My phone call arrived at 945 and that was the worst feeling knowing what I was going to hear. Anyway, here are my little things about Art that I hope I always remember about him....

1) I got him addicted to Jean-Jacques pastries. He wanted to go there every morning until I finally told him that my waistline couldn't afford it anymore and I was going on a diet. Even after we stopped commuting together, a few mornings when I came in there was a bag with my favorite french pastry in it sitting on my desk. Good morning to me!  And on my birthday, he bought me breakfast. I was supposed to return the favor, but his birthday was last Monday and he was in the hospital, so I never had the chance.

2) One day he made us very late leaving work and I was furious because he was acting like he didn't care. We got in my car and I decided that I wasn't going to speak to him the whole way home. He picked up his cell phone and I figured he was calling his wife because he did it every day, then my phone rang. I snapped at him, "Is that you?" And he ignored me, looking out the window. When I looked at my phone it was him, and I just laughed. He always knew how to get me smiling again. We both pretended like we were crying and hyperventilating how sorry we were and I do believe we could have won an Academy Award for our performances. 

3) When he was in a bad mood one day, I decided he needed to release some stress, and I knew about this very bad (meaning bad words) song from my little sister (but it's kind of a funny song) so I played it for him so he could scream it out the window. He LOVED it! Every time he was in a bad mood he wanted to hear it after that, but he would say, "Sandra would die if she knew I was listening to this!" And I would tease him that I was going to put it on a CD so his wife would find it in his car. And every bad driver we saw would get the name of the title of this song for that day. We would laugh and laugh and laugh- who knew the old guy in Finance would be so hip?

4) There were a lot of panhandlers on the way to work when our building was on Westwood Ave. There is an older couple who we would usually see begging at different corners each day, but they didn't look homeless at all- they always looked like they had just gotten out of the shower because their hair was wet and combed. One day we didn't see them, and I said, "I wonder where our little couple is?" Art replied, "Probably at their beach house in Hawaii."

5) I started calling him Artsy-Fartsy, but later shortened it to Artsy (because I figured he didn't really like the fartsy part). The last day that I saw him alive, he and his wife stopped by the house to get his laptop. I forgot exactly what he said but he liked to be an old grump, so I said, "Oh, Artsy Fartsy!" His wife said, "Oh, I like that! I'm going to have to start calling him that!" And he yelled at me, "You're not supposed to tell people about that, Bangie Wangie!"  The day of his funeral I was talking to his wife and she mentioned that one day we would get together and talk about Artsy-Fartsy. That made me smile. 

6) We ate lunch together with my friend Laura almost every day before he started going to the hospital so much, and every morning I would go and visit him for about 10 minutes in his office to see how he was doing. He always had the most positive attitude. The days after he would get his fluid drained off of his abdomen, he would come into work and say he felt GREAT! It was amazing to me. There was only one day that I ever saw him feeling down about what was going on with his disease.

7) He was always so appreciative of your help. One day he was parked in the farthest lot from the building so I told him to give me his keys and I'd move it right outside the stairwell. You would have thought I gave him a million dollars. Always saying, "You are a really good friend to me. I really appreciate you doing that for me."

There are actually many more things, but I would be here forever writing. I will definitely miss you, Art- you really touched my heart......