Lost Sole #259 Dedicated to the "Iceman" Larry Caton, R.I.P.

Well, since i have written so many entries over the last year that have been somber in nature, it has been such a nice change to write the humorous stories lately. This entry will have a little of both.

My friend Eric and I have been playing tennis for a while now. We met up over at the courts to play and usually it is pretty full of players so getting the main court on the end is pretty tough. Well it was open that day and we started to get ready to play on it when Eric stated ‘ man who threw gravel all over the court?” “And why we there flowers on the posts?” At this point the group that had just finished playing there were heading off the court and they answered his question.

“We had a memorial for a fellow player named Larry that just passed away. He loved to play here and had requested to be cremated and his ashes spread out on the courts” he told us. Now if you have ever seen ashes before from a cremation you know there are bone fragments mixed in, so those were what we thought were gravel on the court. “Man that is a lot of ashes” Eric said aloud. “Larry was a big guy.” the one player said as he stepped off the court.

We passed on playing right on his ashes and moved a few courts down to play. But even as far down as we were some fragments had blown down that way. So when a ball hit the ground and took a crazy hop we both knew what happened, it hit a piece of Larry. So whenever something went odd, we would say “Thanks Larry” or “oh Larry!” we felt like we kinda knew Larry after that match, that he was there with us in spirit.

And we are pretty sure both of us probably carried a bit of Larry home with us from holding the tennis balls in our pockets. Im not sure that, what probably seemed like a nice way to give tribute to Larry, turned out to be a good idea. Please, if and when I ever pass I want to be cremated, but do not throw my ashes over cement. Please find a beach somewhere and scatter them like they did my friend Danny’s ashes behind the dock in the sand where we all play volleyball.

A few days later Sharon while at work at The Club was re-telling this story to our friend Belinda when someone there overheard her and spoke up. “I knew Larry. I played tennis with him. He was a nice guy, and yes, he was a big man” she said with a smile.