Gloucester Alumni

My View - Gloucester Daily Times October 24, 2009
by Jim Munn

I went up to Ravenswood Park last Tuesday afternoon to watch the Gloucester High School boys and girls cross-country teams run against Winthrop.

It was a picture-perfect, late October day, with crystal-clear blue skies, mild temperatures with not a hint of a breeze, and the park's wonderfully enveloping canopy of trees ablaze with the brilliant colors of autumn.

Being a creature of habit, I took my accustomed place near the crest of the race course's final hill, some 400 meters from the finish line. Eighteen minutes later, the first-to-race girls, led by our own Abbey Rogers, came storming by, one by one.

It took another 10 minutes for the final girl, her face an expression of pain, to come huffing and puffing along. Moments later, I noticed the familiar face of a noncompetitor also trudging up the hill. It was Molly Ziergiebel, accompanied by an older gentlemen, a person perhaps my age, or near.

"Molly!" I cried out, surprised to see her at the park, though I shouldn't have been. "What did you think of the race?"

"The girls looked great!" she answered, displaying the exuberance and that great big smile that anyone who knows Molly instantly recognizes as the trademark of the entire Ziergiebel clan, a truly wonderful family.

Then, just as quickly as they had appeared, Molly and her companion disappeared over the top of the hill. Only then did it dawn on me how entirely thoughtless I had been not to have asked Molly how her dad was doing — John, a remarkable and truly beautiful human being whose heroic, near-decade-long battle with cancer had so moved and inspired all who knew and so admired him.

The following afternoon, after the O'Maley boys and girls had run their races, and dusk was settling over Stage Fort Park, the team's magnificent home course, I drove to the nearby home of one of my sons for dinner. It was during that occasion that a late arrival broke the news.

"Did you hear that John Ziergiebel died this morning?" he said.

Suddenly, the room fell silent. The young man who had just made the sobering announcement had once been a student in John Ziergiebel's English class at Gloucester High School, as had the two of my sons present at the table. All three considered John a great teacher.

With that stunning announcement, each of us drifted off for a moment, lost in his own thoughts. Mine were of Molly, whom I had just seen, said hello to, and spoken with briefly, only the previous afternoon; Molly, who only hours before her father would slip off to that mysterious realm about which we mortals can only wonder, had so bravely and unselfishly come up to the park to support the team that she had been so important a part of some 10 years ago.

To Molly, wife and mother Anne, and brothers Andy and Sam, the heart of an entire community goes out to you all.

Jim Munn, a regular Times' contributor, had the privilege of coaching all four of John and Anne's children in cross-country at the O'Maley Middle School.