This column runs in the Summer 2019 issue of Heart Beat of the Texas Hill Country

I’ll never forget the day – May 5, 2015 – 5:09PM.  The email read, “Hi Carlotta, Long time no see.  Was wondering if you would care to write for our magazine.  Noticed that Happenings has gone dark and I always loved your columns. Would you have any interest? Either way keep writing cowgirl!  -Greg”

The following day, our call lasted over an hour.  I could tell right away this was going to be a fun gig!  It was so easy talking to Greg.  He understood my passion for sports and respected my ideas.  More importantly, he was as “pumped” about my column as I was!

For the fall issue that year, he dropped me a line a couple of weeks before deadline.    “Do you think you could focus on Texas football?   Your take on the upcoming NFL/college season?  Hoping to have all editorial in by the 15th. We’re at third down and goal to go!”  I already had the column finished when I read his email.  It started with, “For those of you reading this that haven’t lived in Texas, let me explain. Football is the culture — an array of delicacies from the traditional fantasy football leagues to Friday Night Lights to Big 12 and SEC rivalries to The ‘Boys at Jerry’s House or JJ Watt and Company at the NRG. Fall is Texas football!”  Greg’s response?  “Girl — You rock!”  Go figure – it was what he wanted.

Greg not only communicated with me in sports lingo, he also recognized my other passion – the canines!  He already knew about my years of chairing the Bark For Life cancer fundraiser.   When I asked him to run a flyer on a Kerr County Bark in one of the issues, he said he would.  A few days before print, he discovered the copy in his spam.  He emailed me saying, “Hi, somehow you got in my spam list. Just noticed this morning. All is good now. Thanks! (I mean “woof!”)”

I normally decided which sport my column would touch on.  Last year, he had a special request.  “How about a piece on Manu Ginobili?  I know NBA season will be over by summer but I would like a tribute to him.”  I had just volunteered for and attended the NFL draft in North Texas.  My plan was to write about that.  Instead I went with a Ginobili tribute.  It’s always nice to keep the boss happy.  And apparently it made the readers happy too!  The feedback as Greg would say, “Rocked!”

I delayed the NFL Draft to the fall issue.  When he got the copy and pictures, he called me.  “Girl!  You met the NFL Commissioner!  Girl!  You have your picture with him!!  Girl!!  You were on the floor of the NFL draft!  You didn’t tell me about THAT when I asked you to run something on Ginobili!  Manu could have waited! “   We both laughed!

That was the last time we laughed together.   Greg was diagnosed with liver cancer that fall.  I tried to reassure him.  I had been on a caregiver’s journey back in 2015 with my husband’s cancer.  Medical science had made great strides.  Get the treatment and stay on it no matter how awful the side effects are.  Attitude is 99% of the cure.  Stay strong and listen to your body.  Get lots of rest.  You will get through this.

We talked one more time in early March.  There was nothing more the doctors could do and the end was near.  He passed away on the 18^th of that month.  While others think they will see Greg again on the beach in the Jamaican part of Heaven, I know I’ll find him near the San Antonio Spurs angels waiting on Manu.  You rock Angel Greg.  RIP my MVP.