My wife and I met John and Rita about 30 years ago. John and I discovered that we both had been born on April 24, 1938. Friendship developed. We played bridge and tennis together and became the nucleus of a biking group that, I am ashamed to say, I tagged with the name The Awesomes: an acronym for Ageless Wonders Enjoying Sunshine, the Outdoors, Merriment, and Exercise.

John was an indefatigable biker. (Indefatigable? I had to use that because if I said "tireless" it would sound like he was riding on the rims.) On warm weather rides, he always faded back to see how our wives were handling hills and heat, while I was seeking shade and a place to buy a cold drink. I refused to feel guilty because how much help can you give a struggling biker when you are struggling on your own bike? John, motivated by his desire to encourage the slower riders, ended up logging half again as much mileage as the rest of us.

John got his golden handshake from Hewlett-Packard about the time I retired from teaching. Not content with leisure, he started a new career as a teacher of accounting. We talked about his experiences as a 60-year-old first-year instructor. I noted that unlike so many in the profession, John was fixated not on what sort of performance he put on at the lectern but with whether or not his students were absorbing the knowledge and skills he was imparting. He was troubled if individuals performed poorly on tests, and he strove to clarify his presentations, to communicate and to motivate. This trait, so laudable in a teacher, typified John's concern for the happiness and well-being not just of students but of all of his friends and acquaintances. He was unable to be perfunctory in work or in personal relationships.

John and Rita left their Cupertino home to live in East San Jose and bought a weekender in Aptos, adjacent to a fairway of the Seascape Golf Course, to fix up in their spare time. which brings me to the start of my anecdote. Working on their Aptos house, John and Rita became acquainted with an elderly next door neighbor. The woman (I'll call her Abby) had lived there many years before her children departed and her husband died. It was time for her to relocate to an assisted-living facility. John volunteered to help her move.

While packing and taking things to the dump, John discovered an odd collection in the garage. He counted over a hundred egg cartons filled with used golf balls. Abby and her husband used to walk the

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