I’m convinced that the two most important things in life are to marry the right woman and raise great kids. I worry about how many folks I see who are having one or two children, or none. I wonder what they’re going to do with themselves as they get older. I’ve been in government nursing homes and hospice centers. Those places are collections of sad stories.

The point is: if there’s a natural implication in the ideals of marriage and children it’s that we want to love, and we want to be loved. We don’t want to be alone. We want to be useful beyond our own uses. We want to live lives relevant to a greater story.

I struggle to find better proof of the embodiment of these desires than in the flood of love, of affection, of tears, of the fierce fire of friendship and admiration from the young, and aging, and elderly of the Nittany Valley in farewelling Joe Paterno.

The students loved him. Alone, this would be a most powerful epitaph.