My heart is heavy as I offer my condolences to Jack's family.
When I think of Jack, I see his broad and welcoming smile, and I recall the quality of his gentle and insistent intelligence, and his humor that seemed never to fail him. I remember his lovely southern manners which were always so charming to me, and I remember the stories he shared with me, about his childhood and his time in the Marines and his early courtship of Dixie, whom he so clearly loved because it shone from him, and he would amaze me with the quality and clarity of his recollection.
I cherish those stories now...in the small ways that I knew Jack, he seems to have left me with so much, imprinting me with his character somehow, and it's only now that I realize it. I'm thankful and Dearest Jack, I am so lucky to have known you.