Brother George Richard Fontana, F.M.S., R.I.P.

I write today a brief tesimony to a dear friend, Bro. George Fontana, who died on Friday morning, July 29th, after a long, debilitating illness that had all of us puzzled, including the doctors, it seemed. I am happy for George that his long confinement to an existence that was so alien to him has finally ended.
George was only two or three groups ahead of me, but I didn't know him until our halcyon days in Wheeling where our rooms were across the hall from each other at our 7-13th Street residence and we would make each other bend in two with laughter over word-play, puns mostly...funning with punning...or plays on words that would go on and on. We would exchange witty literary delights over the summer while away from each other at courses or summer employ. I still have a folder of "Letters to George" which now will provide a needed connection with the George I remember. When he would appear from Japan or Italy for a Chapter or an Assembly, his first words would always be, "Make me laugh." It wouldn't take long and we'd both be struggling to catch our breath between tales of our mutual exploits or faux-pas with etiquette or language. His tales of his early blunders in Italian still bring a smile. I kept his letters with a reverence, and am happy I did.
Aside from this merry flippancy, George took life seriously, perhaps too seriously, and being principal at the Marist International School in Kobe at the time of the earthquake only added to the burden of personnel issues, and his hated e-mail correspondence, that took much of the pleasure out of him during the scholastic year. No wonder he was thirsting for a laugh when he came home on vacation. His years at Manziana were happy, but whatever his last days at the Generalate entailed, the luster of foreign service began to fade. He entered the hospital almost immediately upon his return to the States last August, and found solace only in his relief from this earthly life and entrance into the life he longed for with God, minus all the gadgets and modern techonological advances that he did not understand, and also loathed as dehumanizing. Yes, we had our fun naming the latest "-od" from the technology shelf, but deep down, he hated them. Well, George, happily you are free from all of that. Pray for us who continue in this valley of ever-increasing technology, and, oh yes, it's your turn to make us laugh.
Bro. Rene