The family and friends army is mobilized.

My daughter, who just lost her husband, is getting the help she needs. Her sister is there. Her brother is on the way. We are leaving Thursday morning. Two of her work friends are there. Other friends are on the way.

This is interesting. When my son was growing up, he had a bubbly little tomboy friend. She was a delight. Her mom remarried, and they moved East. That friend, N.J., lives just a few miles from my daughter. She is still unstoppable. She has organized an army of family and friends. They have already brought in enough food to feed a regiment. They are helping her with everything else, too.

There will be a cremation and a small memorial service for him for his UMass friends and colleagues. He did most of his work out of Fermilab, here in the Midwest, and there will be a larger service there later. He was well-loved there. Everyone from the janitors to the CFO knew him by name. He treated everyone like a friend and sibling. He was a physicist who worked for National Science Foundation, and his own work was Quarknet. He has been to thirteen countries to set up quark labs for students of physics.

That is not the side of him I know best. I know the man who loved my daughter, his own girls, and his many, many friends. He was wonderful to everyone, and a giving person. She could not have had a better partner. Why did this have to happen to my loving, caring child? Why to this wonderful man? She had finally found the perfect mate. He deserved a long life.

I know she will ask why. I have no answer.