John and Jayne

John and Jayne...Jayne and John. They were as inseparable as minutes to the hour. Back in the old neighborhood, John and Jayne Steffler were the folks everyone knew - or knew about. With a big old boat in the driveway sharing real estate with what may have been the bitchin'est custom van in the county, they were hard to miss. Always smiling and impossible to not like, you just knew how much they loved each other by how they treated other people.

John Steffler died this past weekend. I went to his viewing tonight. The obituary said he was a year short of 70, but the man I saw at rest tonight easily looked half that age. As you may know from my other stories, I grew up in a fairly unique household. It was made all the more colorful with John and Jayne stopping by to visit. They lived less than a block away and the late night card games my folks played with them were legendary. At night, when my brother, Dave, and I were quiet long enough - when we should have been sleeping, mind you - the house just shook when John laughed. You couldn't miss it. I could go another 100 years and pick out that laugh. He was the very definition of wiry, with his trademark mustache and a laid back manner that would have made Jeff Spicoli look like a drill sergeant by comparison.

Jayne. Well, what could you say about her? I swear, she hasn't changed one bit in 30 years. She always had an elegance about her that underscored her good ol' girl charm. Tonight was no different. Under the most trying circumstances a person must endure - the death of a loved one - she was grace personified. John and Jayne were married for 48 years. Think about that. Forty-eight years. Most couples don't last 48 months and John and Jayne were together for half a century. It boggles my mind. If the good Lord owed me any favors, I would have asked him to give them 48 more.

John and Jayne would have done anything for a friend and they scored major points with me by treating my brothers and I like real people instead of mere kids, when we were growing up. It was at their house where Dave and I discovered Pong. In this time of the Internet, wireless communication and virtual reality, it might be hard to fathom the excitement Pong had on the country at that time. To two rapscallions like Dave and I, it was better than air hockey - and that was saying something.

John loved hunting, fishing and boating, but he held no gods before his sports teams. The only time you heard him raise his voice was during an Eagles or Phillies game, but it was always short-lived, as the next moment, that laugh - that intoxicating laugh - filled the room. He was lying in state wearing his Philadelphia Eagles gear, a true fan through and through. Even tonight, as my dad pointed out, he seemed to have a smirk on his face. That's one thing those who knew John will never forget - he was almost always smiling.

I had not seen John and Jayne more than once in the past 20 years. Yet, John's passing takes from me a part of my childhood that I'll always hold dear. On the other hand, seeing John and Jayne and the other folks from the old neighborhood kicked up the old forgotten memories like the residue in an old fish tank when you move the fluorescent pirate skull from one end to the other.

Looking at the serpentine line waiting to pay their respects, I was struck by a line from the movie, "A Bronx Tale." In the movie, the mob boss, Sonny, tells the teenaged Calogelo that "nobody cares. Nobody cares when you die" - a point driven home twice in the film. Looking at all the people John and Jayne touched made me realize that people do care, but maybe it just takes a special person - or special people - to make others care. You have touched many, many people in your lives and the world is that much brighter because of folks like you, even if it seems a bit darker today. John and Jayne. Jayne and John. Never one without the other.

Thanks for making me care.