sad news

Text Message received Saturday, Sept 26 at 1:57:43PM from my brother, Frank. “Bob McClung passed away an hour ago.”

A simple message, an incredible message.

Bob was my brother’s best friend. When my father died five years ago, Bob took dad’s place on our fishing trip and flew to Alaska with my brother and sister and I. He helped us spread my dad’s ashes at Rocky Point Resort in the Inland Passage of Alaska, my Dad’s favorite fishing hole. Bob stood by my brother through 37 years of good times and bad; marriages, divorces, work and play, life and death. They met in 1972 as aides in the Johnson Unit, the mental health unit of Sacred Heart Hospital in Eugene. They worked, they laughed, they played together.

For many years Bob has been the stage manager of the Oregon Symphony. He was the man in the tux who directed the set changes; changing the way the orchestra appeared to us in the audience when they added the soloists, subtracted a section, added a grand piano. Each time making sure that everyone knew where they needed to be and that they had the place, the chair, the equipment that they needed. Quiet, unassuming, Bob was there to make sure everything went as planned, no one inconvenienced.

Several months ago Bob developed cancer. He fought it through chemo and radiation; he had good days and bad ones. Some days you knew he had won. Others you worried for his future and that of his new wife. A few weeks ago Bob was eating by himself at a restaurant in Portland when he collapsed and was rushed to the hospital. They tried to stop the bleeding, but found that the cancer was eating through blood vessels. They did emergency surgery to stop the bleeding. It worked for a few days. And then the bleeding continued.

On Saturday morning, Sept 26 at 11:00AM, Bob called his best friend, my brother, and told him “They’re going to take me off life support in an hour. I wanted to call you to say goodbye.” Can you imagine making that telephone call? Can you imagine receiving that telephone call?