Papa
The night he passed after a sudden decline in health, my mother asked that I handle my grandfather's obituary. She specified that it should be something out of the ordinary for printing in a handout at the funeral, with a shorter version for publication in the local news and in his hometown paper. Alas, the journalistic establishment of Scranton PA would not see fit to run anything not in "news format." The internet, though, notoriously lacks editorial standards. Thanks to my editors, who in other guises are my lovely wife and my dear mother; my brother, whose media production skills are frighteningly good; and of course, the man whose recipes I still follow in and out of the kitchen. The Rev. Lt. Col. Carmen Frank Riviello, Sr. (ret., U.S.A.N.C.), last stood about 5'’3"” on his size 8 ½ feet. The buffeting winds of age and care had eroded a full three inches from his height, but not an atom from his wit. As a boy in the Lackawanna coal country of northeastern Pe...