…my friend.  It didn’t matter that it was a cold, damp, drizzly day in New Jersey, as I was going to meet several of my friends that I had worked with, prior to my retirement.   We were all real estate salesmen, and I wound up, after several years in the business, being their Branch Sales Manager.  Through their perseverance, hard work and successes,  they made me shine.  For years they were my other family.  We shared good times as well as not so good.  I have kept in close touch with several of them, and each time I go north I will have lunch with two or three of them.  This particular day we were meeting at one of my favorite Italian Restaurants, whose food is out of this world. Northern New Jersey, Italian food, bread, you can’t beat it.  I thought there would be three or four of us, and yet to my surprise and happiness, there were nine.  Plus, Henry.  He was the really surprised one as we all started arriving.  He was having a businessman’s lunch at a nearby table, and we were like smitten teenagers, we all had to run over, give him a hug and a kiss. We all could tell stories about Henry, and I could probably tell the best ones.  Although much younger than many of us, he was our precious Godfather, and he took his title very seriously; he cared about us, he helped solve our problems, he allowed us to cry on his shoulder and he protected us.  Many of my conversations with him would start with..Hen, what would you do in this case…and just as many times I would see agents huddled with him, as he tried to walk them through a situation.  Most memorable Henry story is the day he came into the office with a commission check of $250,000 dollars.  We of course took pictures of it, and danced around the office, before sending it to Corporate for disbursement.  Henry won National Awards for his New Home Sales successes, and was the pride of our New Homes Division.  Each year as the National Convention rolled around, it was Henry who methodically planned our extra curricula activities, right down to the cars picking us up outside the Hotel.  He introduced us to the best of the best restaurants in each City we were in…a Dallas steakhouse, a famous diner in New Orleans, the best Grouper sandwiches at St.Pete Beach, Paradise Island nightlife in Orlando. We all worked hard, but we certainly spared no expense or energy the week of Convention. On this particular day, I once again found myself turning and calling across to him…what’s good, what should I order?? Over the years, when the National Builder’s Association had their yearly convention in Orlando, I would try to get him to visit The Villages, and to see the building activity here.  Unfortunately he has always been too busy networking to be able to come.  Some day.  However, the others that were at lunch want to come down on mass and see what they are missing. I feel that I have the best of both worlds, I have wonderful memories of the past…pre-retirement, and in The Villages…post retirement, I am always looking forward to what I am going to be doing, today, tomorrow and the next, which will be my memories in the future.