Dear Henry

Today was wall-to-wall sad. In the morning we went to JPDS to watch your class graduate. I felt incredible pride watching Ari graduate. He is so handsome. Each person in the class got up and said something. They pretty much thanked their parents and talked about how much fun they had on their 6th grade trip to New York. Kerren Segal, in her remarks, said:

"If I could wish for one thing to change about my years at JPDS, it would be that Henry Goldberg could have shared in more of our wonderful memories."

That was sweet. When it got to the presentation of the gift from the class, they showed slides of you and last week's dedication ceremony. Here's a shocker. I cried. So did Mom.

After graduation I saw a friend of mine, someone who I don't see very often, in the hallway as I was getting Joe so we could go home. She asked me if I went to graduation - if I had anyone graduating. I said "no."

Later in the day we heard that this guy named Tim Russert died. He is in this picture of Mom, me and your brothers at the Nat's game. His seats were right behind the XM seats. His son, Luke, had a show on XM and is a really sweet guy. I'd say hello to Luke at XM and when I saw him at Nat's games. I never knew his dad.

This picture - which was taken by my very versatile and talented friend Lou from XM - is the screen saver on my computer. Has been since last year.



This is all very sad. Sunday is Father's Day and Tim Russert was the unofficial patron saint of the holiday. He wrote two books about fathers and sons. He really loved and respected his father. In his first book he wrote about what he learned from his father, Big Russ.

I remember a story that Tim Russert would tell about how Luke came home one day with a tattoo. Tim was pretty furious about it. Then Luke showed his dad what he had tattooed and it was his dad's initials. He did that so his dad would always be with him.