lograssonote

Dear Mr. & Mrs. Lograsso,

My name is Tommy Vizza and I live in Harleysville not far from you. I just saw the piece on Kyle on Comcast Sport’s Rise. I was so moved by it that I wanted to share some thoughts with you on it. When I was five, my dad gave me my first golf club and I started on the road of golf. I loved it from the beginning and I dreamed of wearing the green jacket when I got older. I improved as I got older and golf became my passion. I was given the blessing of a scholarship to Penn Charter and spent five years playing at Huntingdon Valley because it was our home course. I remember the first day of tryouts when dad, a janitor from Northeast Philly, was so impressed when he saw HVCC. I am sure that he felt great knowing that his son would be doing more than hitting balls on Lincoln High School’s football field for a change. The Valley was a magical place for me. I became a league champion and earned a scholarship to play at Temple. I was able to travel to many neat places with golf. I played against Jack Nicklaus’s son, Gary, in my first college tournament at Muirfield Village in Ohio and Jack followed us with a hundred other people. I often joke with people, telling them that a lot of people can say that they followed Jack, but not a lot of people can say that Jack followed them. Also, I became friends with a player on our team who was the Austrian Amateur champ, and my relationship with him brought me to Austria a few times, including the occasion of his wedding just three weeks ago. He was in my wedding as well. Currently, I teach math at North Penn High School. Prior to that, I taught at a little private school, where I developed a special relationship with a student, whose name was Kim. She lost an eye due to cancer at the same age as Kyle. Kim’s senior speech was about her road to recovery. She, and her sister that I taught before her, have always been incredibly special to me. They were both presidents of the school when I was faculty advisor to the Student Council and they both went on to great colleges. Kim’s battle with cancer was something that inspired me and those around her. When my son, Joseph, was five, I gave him the exact club that dad gave me. A little over four years prior to this, Joseph had lost his biological father to cancer at the age of twenty-nine. My wife was heart-broken, as am I, when we think that Joseph will never know him the way the most kids know their dad. On my classroom website, I honored dad in the Deep Thought of the Week section of my homepage. It reads, **“Keep your head down and don’t try to kill it.” – My Dad's advice to me for my first golf lesson.** My students were a little confused when they saw it, thinking that it was not so deep. I tried to tell them that these words were special to me because they started me on a road that has been incredible, a road where I saw and did things that sometimes had nothing to do with golf. You are already on an incredible road with Kyle and his golf, a road that I hope and pray will include a stop at a cancer-free world as well as many stops at golf victories. We lost dad on Sunday at Grandview hospital. He took ill suddenly last week and died of complications. We will bury him on Thursday of this week. I guess my point is that my golf took me places, varied and beautiful places. Through golf, I was afforded opportunity and education. These are the things that have changed my station in life. Kyle has probably already figured out that golf is a magical game that not only takes the body to different places but the mind and the spirit as well. I see that your son is on the road of golf and the road to recovery. I am sure that he has dreams of tournaments and great moments of victories over opponents and “knocking it tight” in a pressure situation. I also see that his golf and his fight is also bringing people together to travel the road of cancer awareness, a road that must be traveled by all, if efforts like Coaches for Cancer are to successful. Kyle and all those with cancer are in my prayers. I am sure that God is giving you all incredible strength through this experience. You are great parents in that you are helping him be brave, brave enough to turn sorrow into healing. You have my respect and gratitude for that.

Sincerely, Tommy Vizza mathvizza@comcast.net