Great kids make great cards

First things first. This day, Sunday, is a big one for Hearst Media CT because Colin McEnroe joins us as a weekly columnist. Colin writes two types of columns – good and better. We’re in luck. There. Now . . . Remembering people who remembered me last month, some of whom, I know, will remember me again on my birthday, Feb. 1, also known in my family as “Groundhog Day Eve.”

I do not have far to go before I reach the 8 ½decade mark, so I’m on the lookout for banana peels in my path, ladders to avoid walking under, etc. I want to be able to read my mail from a sitting position, when the birthday cards start to flow into my mailbox here at Keystone Place.

Some people include annual reports with their Christmas cards, or substitute said reports for cards. Lisa and Jerry Traub send both, which is good, because the cards always feature photos of the kids, superior swimmers all, who are no longer kids. Eric, Krista and Matt Traub have all have distinguished themselves in the classroom and in the pool at Torrington High and in college. The youngest, Matt, is in his final college year and in her Christmas report, Lisa said she and Jerry, former University of Maine swim ace and team captain, don’t know what they’ll do when there are no longer any more of Matt’s BU swim meets to attend.

Kids make everything right, so here are more Christmas card kids:

George Smith’s widow, Mary Ellen, sent a card, which arrived the day after the one from her daughter, Anna Shostak. I’m betting you remember George, a former prominent boxing judge, author of five books dealing with WWII and Vietnam and long-time Hartford Courant sports writer. (Capt. George served in Viet Nam in the early 1970s. Ooops, didn’t mean to stray.)

There was no written message accompanying the card, but the pictures were worth more than the proverbial thousand words. Besides parents Anna and Ben, Henry, Owen and Brendan, George’s handsome grandsons, dominated, front and back. What a treat. Old pal George is smiling down, this I know.

UConn athletics are always big news, win or lose, and I always enjoy being reconnected with the friends I made there, through the years beginning in 1960. Recently I had conversations with Hall of Fame coach Jim Calhoun, now cooking along as head coach at St. Joseph’s University – the Blue Jays are winning – and with Dee Rowe, now nearly 90 years old and still actively happy.

But this is about kids and grandkids, and I’m delighted to report that Dom Perno, who served as UConn hoops coach between Rowe and Calhoun and wife Cindy, added to my picture/card collection with a delightful Christmas offering that presented pictures of their grandchildren – apples, I hasten to assure you, of their eyes. There are photos of Isabella, Phoebe, Nate, J.D. Jacob Dominic and Violet.

Oh and one other thing – I received a picture via the Internet of Tinleigh Rose Wilson, born Thursday to the Wilsons, Cole and Mary Beth, of Crescent, Oklahoma. Prettiest little Sooner you ever saw. She is my third great grandchild.