At the end of the movie Saving Private Ryan, Private First Class James F. Ryan stands before his wife at the Normandy American Cemetery in France and asks her a question that catches her off guard.

 

“Tell me I’m a good man?”

 

It was a powerful moment. A man, in the twilight of his life, needed to know if he had lived a life to its fullest, if it meant something positive. Of course, Private James F. Ryan had been delivered from the likelihood of death decades earlier on that same continent and it mattered – dearly – that his wife verify he led a good life.

 

For reasons I will get to at the end of this blog, that scene came to my mind early Tuesday evening shortly after I received a text message from Tammy Aragona. In it were words I was afraid to face – her husband, my friend, Lou Aragona, had passed away.

 

The fact he was my friend is not the reason for this blog. While his loss weighs heavy on me personally, heavy on his beautiful family and volumes of friends, the loss extends beyond that.

 

It is a loss with an impact that can never fully be measured. There may not be a person other than Lou himself who knew the magnitude of help he provided to so many and the multitude of those who received that help.

 

For the better part of a quarter of a century, Aragona was the executive director of the Clarksburg-Harrison Regional Housing Authority and, prior to that, served time in similar roles in Harrison County.

 

Louis Aragona was a community servant – and he lived up to that moniker.

 

There are thousands of individuals over the course of the last 30-plus years that have had a roof over their head because of Lou and because of the staff he worked with. He was the person providing shelter, often for the neediest among us, to allow families to have the beginnings of a normal life.

 

If that were all he did, it would be pretty powerful stuff. It would be a legacy hard to top.

 

Providing shelter. A port in the storm, so to speak. That was a large part of Lou’s work on this Earth.

 

It was not just a 9-to-5 job for him. His obituary, which is linked below, pointed out he was president and founding member of the North Central West Virginia Coalition on Homelessness and other boards that enhanced his ability to assist those in need and provide the basic necessity of shelter.

 

I broke bread with Lou many times over the years. I had more than just a few drinks. And thousands of face-to-face, telephone, and social media conversations. Never once did he bring up what he did for people. To Lou, he was doing his job. To those who witnessed it or were a recipient of it, he was a catalyst in providing a chance at life with a new beginning. I know he never took that lightly.

 

My own family are recipients of the grace Lou Aragona provided. The real beauty of it is one family member he helped Lou had no idea it was a family member. So, when he helped a second, I knew what appeared to be a favor was, in fact, Lou doing what he did for everyone. Silently, professionally, consistently he made that impact over and over.

 

But, as stated above, there was more. Lou was not just good at his job. Lou was also a good boss.

 

In an era where people of authority abuse it, Lou was on the opposite end of the spectrum. He empowered those who worked with him. He encouraged them. He let them grow. He loved them. And he was the captain of a ship of workers who, by all accounts, loved him dearly.

 

One of the few times Lou Aragona talked about the work he was involved with was the day I called him to let him know how very kind one of his staff was in dealing with a family member. I could hear the smile in his voice, and he let me know his entire staff was like that. He wanted me to know he had good people doing good work and talked more that day about what happened in his Glen Elk office than at any time during our friendship.

 

But there is more.

 

Lou Aragona was a family man. While he did not talk about all that he did at work in most cases, talking about family was a different story.

 

When he talked about the past, he would bring up his sister Francie Aragona Wagner. He would talk glowingly about how much he loved her and how she helped raise him as a youth. Lou made sure everyone around him knew just how important she was on any special day that involved her and sometimes just because he felt he needed to let you know. She was important to him, I am certain, until his last breath.

 

As for his wife and kids, that is where he was an open book. He married a woman who I may have actually knew before him, the former Tammy Bork, who was a student ahead of me while I was at Liberty High School.

 

Perhaps in one of life’s far too few fair twists, Lou managed to get the beautiful girl who was that way inside and out. He managed to get the girl who, like him, quietly has, and continues to make, an impact as an educator.

 

Lou never wanted the spotlight shined on him, but when he saw her going above and beyond with her students at Big Elm Elementary during the summer part of the COVID-19 pandemic, he wanted people to know about it and asked me to spread the word.

 

It was not a hard sell on Lou’s part. It was indeed a beautiful story. And when I talked to this educator of 30-plus years, none of it surprised me (Click HERE to read the past blog). After all, there was a lot of good being done by Mr. and Mrs. Aragona living on Sherwood Road.

 

As much as he glowed with Tammy, the real light bulb that illuminated him came when he talked about his two boys Nick and Louis III.

 

They were his pride. They were his motivation. They were, I think I can safely say, his everything.

 

Both boys are recently married. Lou knew those little boys he raised were men, ready to start their own families. The pride he had in those boys could not be hid if he tried. It resonated in his voice and his face – with that ever-ready and easy smile – when they were discussed, or they were with him.

 

The goodness that reasonated in Lou is prevalant in them. Because of that, if you pray, pray for peace and comfort for them. If it is not your thing, keep them in your thoughts. 

 

There is more.

 

Lou Aragona was a friend. A good friend. A true friend. A friend to the end, letting you know he loved you and letting you know it was important to take care of your family.

 

I am not even sure how I got to know Lou. The thing is, I knew of him before I actually knew him because he was the Robin to Vinnie Oliverio’s Batman in the old Grandma House commercials. I would bet actually getting to know him had something to do with his job and my work in the media field going back to the 1990s.

 

I do know we became close in the last 15 years. I believe it was through my friend John Minnocci when the two were workout buddies or serving on the Italian Heritage Festival Board of Directors and John would tell stories about him and our interaction increased.

 

Eventually, we somehow formed a group on social media that I am certain had the blessings of our spouses. Lou, John, Jimmy Coberly, and I got together on a Facebook Messenger group and talked sports. In reality, it was a place to keep the four of us from losing our minds over the Steelers, Pirates and West Virginia University, often in family settings that – at least on my end – contained the occasional dose of foul language.

 

My wife certainly approved of me venting online as opposed to screams from the living room. The conversations eventually went beyond sports and into other realms including our personal lives. With rare exception, and until he recently became sick, I am pretty sure there was not a day in the last five-plus years when I did not have an interaction with him in our private group on Facebook.

 

Fortunately, the conversations also went offline and to the public whether it was at a sporting event, at the Italian Festival, at Primanti’s, Sweet Tee’s, Brickside, the Social Tap or any other place where we would have a few drinks and have a bite to eat. A few times, it was at Lou’s place on Sherwood, where the only thing as good as the food was the hospitality (oh, the man could cook too, which could create an entirely different blog).

 

In our group, Lou was the diplomat. He was our Henry Kissinger, trying to broker peace whenever the sports arguments got heated. Even in the social media world Lou was always doing the right thing. It is a safe bet that was not unique to our group when it came to Lou.

 

The thing is it was crystal clear our foursome I mentioned was not his only group of friends. He was beloved in Bridgeport, Clarksburg, Shinnston throughout Harrison County, beyond that, and places I will never know about. Lou was loved across those borders because he never recognized borders when it came to friendships.

 

You wanted his friendship? It was there for the taking. Once you were his friend, you were his friend for life.

 

Lou had that previously mentioned easy smile and an infectious laugh that was always present. It was forced to the surface by a beautiful soul and serves as a happy reminder that I was able to experience it and sad one in the fact that smile and laugh are gone from this earth far too soon.

                                          

There is plenty more I could tell you about Louis Aragona. There is plenty more I do not know about Lou that could be told.

 

Through it all, we see so easily why his passing hurts so profoundly. The measure of the loss matches his life's impact. It runs deep.

 

We have lost a community servant, a boss, a father, a brother, a husband, and a friend.

 

What we have collectively lost is what no one will ever ask about Louis J. Aragona, and something he would have never had to ask anyone about himself. We have lost a good man.

 

Rest in Peace my friend. Your work here is done.

 

Click HERE to read his obituary.

 

A GoFundMe account has been set up to assist the family's medical expenses. Click HERE to assist. 

 

Editor's Note: Top photo shows Lou with his wife and his two sons, while in the second photo he is shown enjoying an eclipse with some of his trusted staff that includes, from left, Gloria Fox, Mike Jacobs, and Rhonda Lindsey. In the third photo, he's shown enjoying some time with his ever-present smile in his little sports car. The next group shows myself (Jeff Toquinto) with Lou and John Minnocci and Brickside to talk sports and solve the world's problems. Bottom photo shows Lou and Tammy as he watches his beloved Pirates hoping for a win.