My mom liked puzzles. Some were easy. Some were formidable. Some were impossible. And some— as we all know— are enigmatic.  When she suffered horrific tragedies in 1986 and thereafter, life presented her with new challenges. Do you rage? Do you seek revenge? Do you abandon your faith? Or do you wait— sometimes patiently, oftentimes in agony— until you see your loved ones again? There was a day when life’s lessons were not nearly as brutal.  When I was a little kid, there was

I was in Cheers Cafe about a month ago when I sat down with my friend Lois Ciali for a nice chat. She saw me sitting at the end of the bar gazing not into space but at the paneled walls and the Steelers signs and the pictures of friends with friends. I was thinking about her husband, the late Jimmy “Goose” Ciali. He employed me as a part-time bartender through the years. My first stint was in 1991, right after I got married.  My wife and I had an apartment a few blocks up the