1983Bruin
Joined: 9/17/13 Posts: 89
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Posted Fri, Sep 11 12:42 pm
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I just learned that one of our fellow posters, CoronaRay, passed away back in June.
Ray and I both live in Corona, so I had contacted him last year to talk UCLA sports. He came by my house last October for the Colorado football game. He was a true gentleman with an easy smile and a calm, friendly demeanor. It was a genuine pleasure to spend time with him.
Ray and I had phone conversations about getting together again, but he had some health issues that prevented us from doing so. We still spent significant time on the phone talking about UCLA sports.
With football starting up again, I called and left a message about watching some more games together. The fact that I did not hear back from him, combined with his health issues and the fact that I had not noticed him posting on BG in recent months, caused me concern. So, I googled his name and my worst fears were realized when I found his obituary. He was only 54.
Ray disclosed some facts to me that I promised that I would not relay to BG at the time. Now that he is watching the games from above, I hope that he will smile at the telling.
Ray was a life-long UCLA fan. When it came time for college, he was accepted by both UCLA and USC. To his own chagrin, he ended up enrolling at USC because the degree he wanted to earn, a BS in electrical engineering, was not offered by UCLA at the time.
Ray did not hide his support of UCLA athletics while attending USC and he took a lot of heat from his friends and classmates for his loyalty to our team. He refused to support any Trojan teams and, as far as I can tell, his affiliation with the school essentially ended with his graduation.
I think we should treat Ray's time at USC as a quasi POW situation and celebrate the fact that it did not taint him after the experience.
On a more serious note, I think we should (occasionally) acknowledge that not every person who attended USC deserves our disdain.
I think the readers will see why Ray requested that I not previously disclose his time spent on the dark side and I hope Ray would approve of my current disclosure and that the readers will think better of him because of the facts disclosed.
God bless you Ray.
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