Sharon Shula: Father’s death ‘week of horror’
This piece was written by Sharon Shula, one of former Dolphins coach Don Shula’s five children. She is a resident of New York and a lawyer. She has contributed to this space in the past and here she recounts the death, wake and funeral of her dad last week.
SUNDAY, MAY 3
In the evening I made my weekly call to check in on my dad. I was surprised and then worried when Mary Anne picked up.
“Your dad hasn’t been doing so well,” she said. “He hurt his back and has been in pain. But I know he will want to hear your voice.”
She lovingly put the phone up to Dad’s ear.
“Hi Dad, it’s Sharon.”
I heard his heavy breathing and then “Shar...” and a mumble. He knew it was me.
“Are you behaving yourself? Don’t be causing
any trouble.” This was my typical back and forth with him. Another sound, perhaps a chuckle? More heavy breathing.
“Dad you are the toughest person ever so you gotta fight this and I know you can do it.”
Another noise, it sounded like he was clearing his throat.
“I love you so much, Dad.”
“Sharon, he’s asleep,” Mary Anne said. “The best time to get him is between 12 and 1, so why don’t you call back tomorrow? He can talk a little better at that time when the medicine hasn’t knocked him out so much.”
I texted my brother Mike to let him know what was going on, and he said he would call Mary Anne later that evening.
MONDAY, MAY 4
The next morning at 9 Mike calls very upset and says, “his heart stopped.”
I went into crisis mode.
“Well, they have to give him CPR to get it going again. It’s the heavy pain meds. They probably slowed his heart too much while he was sleeping.”
“Let me call Donna back,” Mike said.
At 9:30 a.m. he calls back.
“He died,” he said.
The tears start to fall and a wail forms in my throat.
“On the way to the hospital he died,” Mike said. “The ambulance brought him back.”
This is the fog of crisis. In truth, Dad never got in the ambulance. The paramedics were called and performed CPR at the house. That’s where he was pronounced dead. Congestive heart failure. Mike dials Donna into the call.
“I’ve got to get down there,” Donna said. “I want to see him. Carly is going to drive me.“
“Has anyone reached Annie? She doesn’t answer her phone. Dave knows. He was on his way down to see him when he got the call.“
I keep trying Annie and finally she answers, crying.
“Who is this?” she said.
“Annie, it’s Sharon,”
“What happened?!?” she wails.
Someone who heard from Donna called her already. Annie got dressed and I told her to get someone to drive her to see him.
In New York I am sobbing, wailing and hyperventilating. I throw pillows across the room in anger only to go pick them back up. I won’t be able to see Dad until the wake.
Then it hits me: The giant funeral I had envisioned isn’t possible. Florida has a group of 10 rule due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Our “immediate family” is 46 by my count. Plus a priest.
We will have to sit in rows of 10, six feet apart with masks on! My family!
Mike and I meet at the airport and I get to see his wife Shari, the warm bundle of love, for a hug of strength, oldest daughter Samantha for her enduring heart and love, and Brooke for her strength and our middle daughter bond.
They pulled up after I checked in. What a kismetic meeting. Strength and love filled me.
I know the airport well and getting to security isn’t hard. There are only five people in line. Even with social distancing we speed through. Breathing through my mask makes me sweat. I wear gloves the whole time. I’ve been locked in my apartment since March, but who knows where
COVID is? I’ll be damned if it is going to keep me from Dad.
We board and as I sit I see more and more emails. I feel a pain deep in my gut. It’s not heartburn. It’s pain. It’s heart pain. I keep myself busy answering the emails, amazed that friends from grade school, high school, law school, and old clients, are writing. I am even more amazed at the ones I expected to hear from but haven’t.
Death makes people act strangely. Perhaps the ones who you didn’t expect to hear from feel death is the time to keep the past in the past. Fine with me. Death does make you realize how petty past behaviors have been, or have we just grown up? The ones who reach out certainly have shown that to be true. One more realization out of such a sad time.
THURSDAY, MAY 7
It’s Annie’s birthday. Today I will see him. For the the first time he will not be moving, without his energy, without the anticipation that he is pretending to be asleep to scare me with a snort or grab. I want to hug him, hold him, tell this giant of a man how much he meant to me. But that time is over. I am grateful I did have those weekly calls in the last year to tell him these things. He always replied jokingly, but I know he didn’t miss what I was trying to say.
I am so proud to have been his daughter. Traits his players are recalling, like discipline and integrity, were first taught in our home. We learned with the caveat, you can’t make me look bad; my reputation is on the line. Don’t screw up all I’ve worked so hard to build.
“Friends” thought I was egotistical because I lived by his rules, even now. It is too wonderful a legacy. I do want to be like him. What is wrong with that? Did I feel I was better than others?
Only in that I had a higher standard to live up to. I don’t judge others by that standard only myself. If I walked away from situations, it was because in my heart I knew my dad wouldn’t approve. We had to do better. He stood for excellence and if his kids didn’t what kind of a leader would he be?
It made for a lot of lonely nights, and days, and situations. Dad’s voice was my constant companion and North Star.
My mom was 57 when I lost her and now I am 57 and have lost Dad. Hopefully I have become wise enough to go on with enough of his wisdom and my own to carry on some part of his legacy.
Dad lay calm, still, dressed in a dark suit and orange tie — yes, for the Dolphins. He was shaven smoother than I had ever seen him. I reached out with both hands to touch his face expecting that snort he always crowed to startle everyone who was that close. We always went back for more, his blue eyes shining, and that laugh that he would emit, proving you were a loved one.
I recognized my thin lips on him as I examined this handsome man who had so influenced my life. I lay my head on his chest wanting to feel that strength he always exuded just one more time. I held his now cold hands. Touched his ears as he often did in thought and nervousness, wanting to capture that Don Shula magic.
I fought so hard to hold back tears but they flowed nonetheless, as sad tears do.
“You can do this, Sharon.” I heard him say in my head.
“You’re my girl and I know how tough you are.”
I stood up proud and smiled, thinking of what he would want me to do.
I turned around and went to hug Mary Anne.
Later, each of my siblings and their children huddled around Dad, arm in arm, saying a prayer, thanking him for all he has given us, for all he taught us, and for the legacy he has provided for so many.
A part of me wondered what play he was calling in each of those family huddles.
FRIDAY, MAY 8
The Funeral:
My brothers and nephews guide the deep brown and silver casket down the aisle at St. Joseph’s Church in Surfside to the hymn “Lord of the Dance,” dad’s favorite.
I am the Lord of the Dance said he...
And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be...
And I’ll lead you all in the Dance said he...
My sister Donna did the first reading a psalm and I did the response after the homily, forgetting to bow before the alter, saying “Lord, have mercy,” instead of “This is the word of the lord.” Dad would have chuckled and shook his finger at me.
Mary Anne told me as I left the altar that “he would have loved that.” I did remember to bow after she said that and I knocked on the wood of Dad’s casket for luck as I walked by.
He always said “never take any wooden nickels,” but I wanted a piece of him just one more time.
Dave and then Mike eulogized Dad, they said, to continue the theme of his induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Dave again went first, indicating that his goal was to explain to his grandchildren — Logan, Connor and Dean — what all the fuss over the death of their great-grandfather was about.
“It was how he lived his life that was so remarkable,” Dave explained.
“There are certain themes that sum up the way Dad lived his life. ... Honesty, playing by the rules, never giving up, lead don’t follow, working as hard as you possibly can, having faith and loving your family.”
Mike spoke about how Dad came from a close family, raised a close family, and after our mother died, created another close family with Mary Anne and her children.
Tears flowed from me and every family member, including the family that cared for Dad: Arthur, Jackie and Pam.
This was the Shula group that so adored the man who had become the wisecracking, card-playing, left-right-center competitor in retirement. The man who read his own biographies over and over in the last year after having sent autographed copies to all of us for Christmas. The man who gloated over his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, saying that he “couldn’t believe they could run as fast as they said they could,” motivating them to run faster, of course.
The man who, every time you asked him how he was feeling responded:
“I feel like the bottom of a stove ... Smokin’ hot!”
And the man who never failed to wink, smile, wave, or say “love ya, honey” whenever I spoke to him.
As I look back on this week of horror I ask, why now? Granted he was 90, but he danced until 1 a.m. on his scooter in February with Marc Anthony and the rapper Wycliffe Jean at a Super Bowl party.
He had been truly surprised at his 90th birthday party. He had participated in NFL 100 events throughout the football season. Most recently, his routine hadn’t changed with the exception of no social events due to the coronavirus.
Mary Anne said he was in pain.
Wait, Don Shula was
never in pain. That was his signal to us. He was trying to tell us he was ready to go. The pain pills just slowed him down a bit.
Once Don Shula felt pain, he was done. He was being called to a better place where he would once again no longer feel pain.