Champions

I know my Roxanne is smiling tonight, and not alone. As with the rest of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, I know that somewhere, she is taking note of the NCAA basketball championship won a few hours ago by her beloved Wildcats. I smile to think of how, with blustering enthusiasm, she is regaling anyone who will listen with tales of her love for the program. I know this, because this is how she lived. And even in death, the things that matter endure.

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In the statement I posted at her death, I described Rox as a proud Kentuckian, by way of New Jersey. She loved her adopted state of Kentucky. In lockstep with most other Kentuckians, basketball -- and the fate of the University of Kentucky team -- was one of her passions. You can credit me, or blame me, for that. In 1980, as we watched (at my insistence) UK facing Louisiana State in the final game of the season with the Southeastern Conference championship on the line, Rox looked at me sternly, and in all seriousness, growled, "I'm missing The Love Boat."

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This is Roxanne's one and only tweet. She joined Twitter only for the specific purpose of welcoming Coach John Calipari to the Big Blue Nation. She missed the official start of practice by just under three weeks.

My duty was clear. I had to bring her into the fold. It took a few years, but eventually, she found a taste for the Big Blue Kool-Aid. In time, she became more stricken with Cat Fever then even I was. She even once changed doctors, because hers wanted to refer her to a specialist educated at Duke University. Her death, on the brink of the John Calipari era at Kentucky, was cruel in its timing. On her last day of life, she joined CoachCal.com, the coach's website. She signed up for Twitter only so she could sent a tweet to Cal. She did (see photo). It was the only one she ever sent.

But sadness be damned. I know if Earthly perceptions continue in whatever lies next, her smile today will be as bright as ever.

Me, I'm happy. The team I love, the team I've passionately followed all my life, sits atop the world. And understandably I'm also sad. This championship, like the first two of my lifetime, came without her at my side. But in her way, she never leaves me, because, as I've said so often on LIFE 4.0, she is such a part of who I am, that we are inseperable.

Today's Lesson? Joy and triumph may only be felt in this existence. No one knows. But if they can span the gap between here and wherever she now calls home, my Roxanne is having the time of her afterlife today. And why shouldn't she? God knows she's earned it.

StevenK