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| John Fuoco -- Photo by Andrea Matney |
It
wasn’t unexpected. He’d been
fighting the cancer gnawing at his lungs for a half dozen years.
But
to me, John Fuoco wasn’t dying. He was living. Cancer had many times pushed him
to the brink and every time he had pushed back. Long after others would have given up, John lived. He lived through the unspeakable
torture of countless procedures and chemotherapies.
He
lived to ride his bike, to treat hundreds of his patients, to attend his
children’s weddings, to see his grandson born, to love his wife, and to inspire
hundreds, perhaps thousands, of us.
Only
a few days ago, he and I were swapping hopeful texts about riding together
again this summer. Now, we will,
but only spiritually.
Before
cancer, John was one of the best ultra-distance cyclists in America. He won
races stretching hundreds of miles. He rode among the best in the world’s
oldest bicycle event, the 750-mile Paris-Brest-Paris. He held the record for
riding across Pennsylvania.
After
cancer, he applied his incredible energy, strength, sense of humor, and
discipline to defeating his disease.
Toward the end, he told me he was “failing,” a term of art in his
medical profession.
To
me, John never failed. In his
favorite long-distance cycling sport, Randonneuring, there is no “winner” or
“loser.” But there is a “first
finisher.” And that’s what John
was.
In
life, like on the road, he finished ahead of the rest of us.
