"Uncle" Cliff (a.k.a. the Strawberry)

Photo: Price Waterhouse circa mid 1950's.
Tom Kemp Sr. - front left. Cliff Hey - front center.

Dad's longtime friend, Cliff Hey, passed away last week. We went to his service on Saturday and were reminded of all the fun times we had with the Hey family. Tom Hey said he didn't realize what a thing his dad had for hats until looking at the photos they'd assembled of him. Emily and Claire remember him when he came to Laguna dressed as a strawberry. That apparently is the first time Jenny met him as well. One of the photos showed him dressed as a bunch of grapes and his eighty year old mother by his side, dressed in the strawberry costume.

Katie Hey told of how her dad would invite 18 people over for dinner at the last moment and Cliff would polish the silver and arrange the flowers and Nancy did everything else. We were reminded of his exquisite yet sometimes bizarre taste in antiques and collectibles, which led him to start Mountain Treasures Antiques with mom, and yet also prompted him to have a giant chicken in his backyard, a collection of "best bitch" trophies, and a silver plated oreo which, of late, he kept in the basket of his walker. And who could forget Cliff's comment about my sister Nancy, "She'd make a wonderful wife... for a deaf man."

Dad and Cliff used to compete to be the first to call each other on Ash Wednesday. It started when they were at Price Waterhouse and one day dad commented on someone having a dark spot on their forehead. Cliff explained that it was Ash Wednesday and the spot would be, well, ashes. From then on, for almost fifty years, they would call on that day. Paula and Katie have made a pact to continue the Ash Wednesday phone calls, which is about as fitting a tribute to Cliff (and dad) as I can imagine.

Here is the letter Cliff sent to the CPA Board in 1958 recommending dad for membership. It's vintage Cliff... Double click to make it larger.