It’s been a bit of a rough weekend for Switchback.
The weekend prior, we were in Buffalo, Minnesota where we had played a memorial for Maggie FitzGerald’s (Brian’s wife) brother, Michael. He had passed away from a heart attack in May and the shock of that was still palpable in the group of family and friends who gathered in his memory. Still, it was a cheerful affair, and I got to hang out with Maggie’s brother Sean, who I had known almost as long as Brian. Grilled steaks and way to many sides abounded, and Sean and his wife Kristi played host to a collection of grandkids, dogs, far-flung visitors and local fishermen.
Sean was one of the first to greet Switchback to Minnesota. I remember him pulling from a wood burning stove a plateful of wild ducks that he had shot. “Careful as you bite in,” he said. “Might still be some buckshot in there.” I savored the duck and chewed cautiously. Sean would loan me his Sharps Rifles books, all about a rough and tough British fighting unit, doing battle with the French in Spain during the Napoleonic wars. They were well written, and I was happy to know a guy who was as much of a geek about such novels as I am. We watched the History Channel and commiserated on how our wives will roll their eyes whenever we put on such shows. Sean sat during our concert, and we specifically played The Rocky Road to Dublin for him. During the memorial for Michael, Sean kept us all in stitches with his recollections of his younger brother, randomly offered during recollections of Michael’s life. The final end of the service were the most delectable sunfish filets, caught on Lake Buffalo, where the Cronin boys loved to fish. They were lightly battered and deep-fried to perfection. It was almost like a communion of sorts, the sharing of the love for Minnesota and life well-lived.
It was a great weekend, and I drove back to Chicago, tired, but happy to reconnect with everyone.
A week after the memorial service, this past Saturday, Switchback was about to take the stage at a parish festival in Evanston, Illinois when we received the news that Sean collapsed that morning and died. Like his brother Michael, he had a seizure, and the paramedics were unable to revive him. Just like that, a person who was vibrant, alive and had just texted me on Wednesday was now gone.
The show goes on. It has to go on, even when shock and grief are front and center. Somehow, you channel all of that into the show. You take that person you love and channel that love into a musical offering of energy, joy and humor.
No one lives forever and no one knows when we get to the off-ramp. It will happen and when it does, no one is truly prepared for it. The only real preparation is to remind people of how much they mean to you and how much you love them. The last thing Sean shared with me was his gratitude. “Love you my friend,” he wrote.
I remember once reading an old wooden grave board out in Pine, Colorado. On it, someone had carved “And God said, Bring me a man to match my mountains.” It wasn’t until later I found it was an adaptation of a poem written by Sam Foss. It sums up the wonderful man Sean Cronin:
Bring me men to match my mountains,
Bring me men to match my plains,
Men with empires in their purpose,
And new eras in their brains.
Bring me men to match my prairies,
Men to match my inland seas,
Men whose thoughts shall pave a highway
Up to ampler destinies,
Pioneers to cleanse thought’s marshlands,
And to cleanse old error’s fen;
Bring me men to match my mountains –
Bring me men!
Bring me men to match my forests,
Strong to fight the storm and beast,
Branching toward the skyey future,
Rooted on the futile past.
Bring me men to match my valleys,
Tolerant of rain and snow,
Men within whose fruitful purpose
Time’s consummate blooms shall grow,
Men to tame the tigerish instincts
Of the lair and cave and den,
Cleanse the dragon slime of nature –
Bring me men!
Bring me men to match my rivers,
Continent cleansers, flowing free,
Drawn by eternal madness,
To be mingled with the sea –
Men of oceanic impulse,
Men whose moral currents sweep
Toward the wide, unfolding ocean
Of an undiscovered deep –
Men who feel the strong pulsation
Of the central sea, and then
Time their currents by its earth throbs –
Bring me Men.
READ MARTIN’S OTHER BLOG HERE.