Dad

Tuesday, 24 April 2007

Took the day off from work today as we had to meet with the reverend to talk about Dad and discuss the program for Sunday. I had emailed a sportswriter, Kalani Simpson, on Sunday night to let him know that Dad passed away, as Dad had me write him about a month ago.

Looks like he wrote an article printed in tonight's Honolulu Star Bulletin.



Sidelines
Kalani Simpson


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Mau sticks around long enough to say good-bye

JOHN MAU died last week, late at night on April 17, surrounded by family and friends. He was 59. He would have been 60 on May 23.
He was an athlete all his life.

Mau is the man who is known for receiving the first scholarship in the history of University of Hawaii men's volleyball. Mau would later smile at this, and explain that volleyball coach Larry Price -- yes, that Larry Price, this was 1970 -- had hustled up one "tuition waiver" and split it between Mau and Steve Kop. Mau got $116.25 for one semester, Kop got the same for the other semester, and they were in the history books.

Mau loved the UH men's volleyball program, loved the alumni matches. Last week, after the news broke, Bob and Linda Nunokawa brought over the shirt they'd saved for him from the last alumni match, the one Mau at last hadn't been able to make. He'd loved those shirts. He wore them all the time.

Services will be Sunday, at Nuuanu Memorial Park and Mortuary. It was picked partly because they needed a place that would be big enough.

"He was well loved by everyone," friend Clift Chee said.

It turns out the mortuary director knew him from his park basketball days.

He was an athlete all his life.

MAU DIED FROM ALS. He was diagnosed with the neurodegenerative disease in October 2004.

First his 3-pointers fell short, then his golf drives, too. Then his back hurt. Then there was numbness. Then he couldn't walk.

At last, not long before he died, he couldn't speak.

That's the cruelest part about ALS. Your brain works just fine, as all around you, your body fails you. Inside, he was the same person.

He knew 40 years ago he and his fraternity brothers would be close friends today, and they are. He wanted to be cremated so he wouldn't take up too much space. Friends are working on putting a plaque in his honor at McCoy Pavilion, where he was the manager at the end of his 30-year career with City parks and rec. One of his nicknames was "Two and a Half Beers Mau."

HE WAS SO giving of himself, "As a wife, it can be frustrating at times," his wife, Bernice, once said.

He decided not to go with a ventilator, or a feeding tube. He knew the inevitable. He knew what was coming. About a year ago he held a huge party, while he was still "good," so everyone could sing and tell stories and laugh and cry.

He was an athlete all his life.

He told his daughter that if she and her sweetheart were thinking about a wedding, they should probably get to it. In February, his son pushed a wheelchair and a car battery-powered BiPAP machine and his daughter held his hand. He walked her down the aisle.

She's hapai with his first grandchild.