Mark Clayman

Mr. Akron has died. Mark Clayman aka Marky Marky the Hat (from his old Cleveland days) and other names too numerous to mention has left us-for good this time. He is not just mad at us this time. He is gone. There will be no more stacks and stacks of reading materials. There will be no more jazz and rap CDs. There will be no more NPR on the radio in the kitchen 24 hours a day so that Bob Smokey and Calli have something intelligent to listen to while he is at work. There will be no more obscure political magazine subscriptions among other out of the mainstream pulp. There will be no more visits with Mark carrying his Pepsi in its designated holder. There will be no more treatises on why unions are still king. There will be no more lectures about Akron politics. There will be no more never ending discussions on why water mains break. There will be no more collections of Day of the Dead memorabilia. There will be no more collections-period. There will be no more tattoos. There will be no more hats worn promoting everything from his favorite causes to a farm equipment dealer. There will be no more late night calls to Mark asking where a certain place is in Akron only to be berated for not knowing that the place had been torn down years ago. There will not be more Pepsis collected in the back of the truck. There will be no more e-mails from Mark at 3:30 AM passing along jokes from Harvey or notices about upcoming events. There will be no more fish frys or fireworks at R & R's with Mark holding court. There will be no more 7:00 PM calls (not 6-not 8) to Kay (the love of his life) on Saturday nights to recap the week's events There will be no more traveler's blessings to Larry when he goes out of town. There will be no more meetings with Lee (his anchor) to whisper about whatever they were whispering about. There will be no more talk about visiting the Sue and Kathy farm or even listening to Kathy's excellent answering machine voice. There will be nobody bragging anymore about the PR Miller installation in his own backyard (thank you for all of your generosity Kate). There will be no more trips to Kent to gain added wisdom from his guru George. There will be no more purchases of single packs (never cartons) of Camel non-filters. And then there is the food. There will be no more purchases of Acme chocolate chip muffins. There will be no more West Point Cheese Cakes. There will be no more Bangkok Gourmet meals ('how you doin Mak?) There will be no more Raj Mahal meals. There will be no more Alladin take-out. Akron restaurants will suffer. There will be no more tales of Spaceman and his many adventures. There will be no more reminiscences of Ron and their early days in the Cleveland State dorm and later at the hellhole on E.30th or even reminders of the bird lady at the even bigger hellhole on E. 24th. And the kids. The self-proclaimed Uncle Marky the kiddies pal is no more. The kids learned much at an early age. And then there is Sally. The force of nature and the tie that bound it all together. There will be no more Sally complaining about Mark or Mark complaining about Sally. All that remains is the love. For so many others close to Mark who I did not mention the omission is not intentional. Mark touched many many people in his life and nobody that met him will forget him. Here's to Mark J. Clayman. An original. An iconoclast. A once-in-a-lifetime. We were just all lucky enough to be part of his life.