Richard was a big sports fan. His bedroom is decorated in Miami Dolphins colors. They were his favorite NFL team.

We had many sports talks. The sports minded members of my family are University of Kentucky fans. I went to school there in the 70’s . My parents had season tickets to the football games. My dad and I still go to all the home games along with my brother and his wife. So Richard decided he would be the fly in the ointment and be a University of Louisville fan. UK and UofL don’t like one another.

I think he did this mostly to irritate my brother Stuart.

I always felt he was mostly faking it. He always followed UK a lot more closely than he did Louisville. He just liked to argue.

This fall Richard was supposed to be attending the University of Kentucky for the first time. He was excited about it.

He had big plans for the annual UK vs UL football game. It was a home game for UK. Richard planned to wear his UL red t-shirt to the game. Right in the middle of the UK student section. We talked about it often.

I was really looking forward to tailgating with my son and his girlfriend at all the games this fall. I have been going to these games with my dad for many years, and looked forward to continuing this tradition with Richard for many more years.

But Richard never got to attend UK.

I thought about wearing a UL shirt in memory of him. But I knew the emotional load would be too much. I would have spent the entire game remembering why I was wearing the wrong colors.

I guess the games will never be the same.