Blue skies, smiling at me;
Nothing but blue skies do I
see.
Blue birds, singing a song;
Nothing but blue birds all
day long.
Never saw the sun shining so bright;
Never saw things looking so
right.
Noticing the days, hurrying
by;
When you’re in love, my how
they fly.
Blue Days, all of them gone;
Nothing but Blue Skies from
now on.
When I first heard this Frank
Sinatra tune I wanted to remember it as a kind of toast. It is such a beautiful
thing to wish for someone – blue skies and sunny days. Of course, life doesn’t
work that way and true character is built on how we negotiate the squalls and
dark clouds of adversity.
My son Ben will be married
later this year. Ben and Allison met in Miami as students at the “U.” The Coral Gables campus is an especially
beautiful place when the sky is blue and the sun is shining. In South Florida,
if you spend enough time there, you really grow to love the feeling of being in
paradise all the while knowing it cannot last. The Miami football team will win
57 home games in a row. The team will be declared a college football dynasty. Eventually, of course, they will be defeated.
The Orange Bowl will be torn down. A spectacular baseball stadium will take its
place. Tropical Storms will cause massive flooding, Category five Hurricanes
will reach landfall and the Everglades will catch fire. But in spite of it all
you will never forget the beauty and color of a casual walk through the
Fairchild Tropical Gardens and remember just how fantastic things can be.
Ben and Allison we love you.
We wish you all the best that life has to offer. Still we are also painfully
aware of the ebb and flow of things. You will be tested. You will see storms.
You will have setbacks. But you will face them together and that will make a
world of difference. I think you both understand this concept because I see how
you both cherish every moment together. You took the time to preserve in a
painting the profoundly mature thought: “Life does not have to be perfect to be
wonderful.” If you know that to be true, nothing can stop you from having a
remarkable life together.
While we cannot promise
anything, we can still wish this for you both:
Blue Days, all of them gone;
Nothing but Blue Skies from
now on.
