Max

One of our family’s oldest and greatest friends, Max McCrohon, died yesterday. He’d been sick a long time with emphysema (I remember him as an unregenerate smoker of unfiltered Camels) and, for the past three or four years, with lung cancer. There’s a lot I could say — that everyone in my family could say — about Max (and about all the McCrohons). For now, just this: He was the one who inspired me to become a journalist and who gave me my first opportunity to work in a newsroom. And he and his wife Nancy somehow were always welcoming to the Brekke kids; their home was always, always open to us. I honestly can’t imagine what my life would have been like without him, and them.

2 Replies to “Max”

  1. Dan,
    Max made a positive contribution to all of the Brekke lives. It’s hard to imagine Max gone with his
    quiet Australian voice, never raised, and his soft subtle humor.
    Dad

  2. Thank you for sharing your thoughts. I found the following poem appropriate.
    aki yama no
    arasi no kowe wo
    kiku toki Fa
    ko no Fa naranedo
    mono zo kanasiki
    In the autumn mountains
    Howls a storm;
    Hearing it,
    Though I am no tree-leaf
    I am struck with sudden sadness.
    Archbishop Henjô
    Shûishû III, poem 207

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