RIP Joe Szewczyk

I only met Joe once, but I’d heard about him a lot.

I hadn’t realized that he passed away just the other week, until I ran into a couple of guys as I was walking my dog on his property this morning. It’s the first day of turkey season, and Rick and Tom had the whole hunting thing going on: camo blinds, decoys, an ATV…

Seems I got a couple of things wrong in the hearsay I heard said about Joe. According to his obit, he was born in Canada, whereas I’d thought he was born in the old country. And he was only 82.

Joe’s extended clan always come up for deer hunting season, and Rick and Tom were apparently close enough to have been part of that, and also close enough to stay at the main cabin down at Mary Lake while they’re up here for turkey season.

Me and the Farm Manager were down at Mary Lake one time, throwing sticks into the water for the dogs. Joe’s property manager showed up in short order to check us out. I figure Joe must have had some kind of security camera system set up around the place.

Be that as it may, once he knew who we were, he was exceedingly generous, and made it clear that we could walk our hounds on his property any time we liked.

Thanks, neighbour.