If you have seen Jersey Boys, or if you like Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons, you know that one of their hits was Oh What a Night. Here is how the song begins:

Oh, what a night, late December back in 63

What a very special time for me

As I remember what a night!

We are a small family. On Christmas, Jill and her husband René came over. We had a family game day. Afterwards, we looked back at old photos and other memories. We found a Roanoke Times front page photo of Nancy and our daughter Jill taken February 13, 1984 at Cassell Coliseum, Blacksburg, Virginia. That night Virginia Tech beat Louisville 76-74.

I love the photo, even though over the years it has a crease running through it. As you will see, Nancy is enthusiastically cheering on the Hokies and Jill, in her cheerleader uniform is asleep. The next day, after the front page photo appeared in the paper, Jill’s teacher called Nancy. She told Nancy that she now understood why Jill occasionally fell asleep in class.

I am not in the photo because that night I was returning to Roanoke from an out of town business trip. I remember vividly that an engine on our Piedmont Airlines jet caught on fire and when we landed at the Charlotte Airport the entire runway was lined with fire trucks and other emergency vehicles. We landed safely and eventually I was able to continue on to Roanoke. Oh, what a night.