Jerry was the first child of Ruth and Walter King. They lived in a small house on Guerrero Street in San Francisco, then a house on 20th Street, and finally the house where Jerry spent most of his childhood: 4588 19th Street.

Jerry’s sibling Nancy was born in 1933. Thomas was born in 1935. And Dolores was born in 1937. Their mother Ruth fawned over Jerry, sometimes commenting to his siblings, "Wouldn’t he make a wonderful President?" Nancy, Thomas and Dolores were of course charmed by this, and started calling him "President Jerry."

Jerry went to grade school at Most Holy Redeemer, then high school at Saint Ignatius.

Around this time, Jerry got a job at the main branch of the public library at Polk and McAllister. Here he made many of the friendships that would last him a lifetime: Jack Goodwin, Bill Keating, Tom Laine, Ted Hayes, Rudy Lopez and Lou Barberini.

These friends, and eventually their children, and then their grandchildren, played a football game every Thanksgiving: the A-Bowl. It is a tradition now going on its 53rd year.

Through Lou Barberini, Jerry met Lou’s younger sister, Margaret Barberini -- Rita.

Jerry, after three years at San Francisco State, then a year at Fort Ord and in Korea, returned to San Francisco State, and fell in love and married Rita. The year was 1955.

In quick succession, Jerry and Rita had seven children: Kathleen in 1956, Thomas in 1957, Daniel in 1958, Robert in 1959, Judy in 1961, Margie in 1963, and Nancy in 1966. These were, to put in lightly, busy years.

Jerry and Rita bought a house in San Jose where they lived the next 32 years.

Jerry worked as a computer programmer for General Mills, then IBM, and then Control Data Corp. He became manager of a software group that designed the first major timesharing network in the USA. More importantly, he was a ten-minute bike ride from home.

In 1994, Jerry retired. And Jerry and Rita moved to the Villages in the San Jose foothills. Again, in quick succession, Jerry and Rita would up with 17 grandchildren.

There are the facts. But what the facts fail to suggest is who exactly Dad was, how much he loved, how much he was loved, how much he made people laugh, how much he liked to laugh, how much he wanted to spend every waking and sleeping minute with Mom.

How would we describe Dad to a complete stranger?

We could start with his snoring. So loud it would shake the house. Or we could talk about the way his top lip stuck to his teeth whenever he was embarrassed; and the way his daughters teased him endlessly about it.

But we should probably start with his sense of humor.

Dad was one of the funniest, wittiest, and rudest men we’ve ever met. He was caustic and unsentimental, his jokes always geared to shock. In fact very little of his humor can be mentioned here. Well, maybe something.

Dad always joked that when he died he wanted Uncle Boyd to load him on the back of his pickup truck, and sell peaks at him for ten dollars a pop. It would save money.

Dad’s humor was also a listening humor.

Dad loved to laugh. He loved to hear his children or their spouses tell stories or recount adventures: Judy’s speech to her class about how to sabotage the San Luis Obispo nuclear power plant; Tom’s complete retelling and acting out of the movie The Omen; Nancy’s Perry-Mason-like moment of catching a murderer in a lie on the stand; Margie’s devastating imitation of relatives.

Dad would hate, truly hate, having any characteristic of his described as "twinkling," but as he encouraged us to tell stories over and over again -- allowing is to add new self-glorifying details each time -- that’s exactly what his eyes would do.

To describe Dad to a complete stranger, we’d also have to explain his embarrassment at all cheap sentiment and showy affection.

He could not stand Hollywood movies. To watch TV with Dad was to watch TV alone. He could never tolerate more than ten minutes of it. Any gushiness, any heart-on-a-sleeve showiness, and handholding made Dad supremely uncomfortable.

Well, we children used this to our advantage, taking every opportunity we could to make Dad squirm by dragging him into one of our group hugs. We did more hugging than any family alive because we liked to see him squirm. Dad would return the favor by coming home sweaty from tennis and trying to hug is in return.

Dad hated showy affection partly because he had such a vast quantities of real affection: unconditional affection for his friends: Leo and Jerry, Dorothy and Jack; George and Bev and Tony; Chuck, Bob; unconditional affection for his family, their spouses, and his grandchildren.

His love was so deep and heartfelt, one had to point it out to him before he’d acknowledge it.

When Margie saw Dad wearing slippers he never wore -- he hated slippers and all other accessories -- it was only after being prodded that he admitted they belonged to a friend, Tony, who had died and he wanted to remember him.

When his grandchild, Gina, at six-years-old, drew a Christmas tree on his white board at work, Dad didn’t erase it not for two days, or two months, but two decades. Instead, he squeezed his work into little incomprehensible columns all around it.

When Judy in grade school made a paper-mache elephant the size of a beer keg, Dad kept it on his desk at work -- where it covered practically half his workspace -- for ten years.

To describe Dad, we’d certainly get around to how much he loved tennis. He was a true athlete, graceful and succinct, in his movements.

As good as he was, it was always more important to him that everyone play than anyone win. Doubles with Dad was always a struggle to keep him from pulling a four-year-old grandchild into the game. He was the best sort of athlete: one who didn’t have anything to prove.

One of the great attributes of Dad’s personality -- and this phrase would certainly bring one of those sour looks to his face -- was his moral weight. When Dad said it, we knew it was true.

Dad and Mom showed us how to be good. They showed us the need to support each other. They showed us the worth of hard selfless work; that we can’t be crybabies; we have to be self-contained.

Most-importantly, Dad showed us that the stronger always have to help the weaker. When we backpacked, he always hiked at the rear of the group. Not because he was the slowest, but because he was the strongest, the most able to help the rest.

We know of no man who better embodied the parable of the Good Samaritan than Dad.

We looked up to Dad. We would do anything to make him proud of us. When he was proud of us, it was like the universe was proud of us.

And finally the last way to describe Dad to a complete stranger -- and it only comes last because it is the most painful -- is his love for us.

His love of family. His love of his children. His grandchildren. And most importantly his love of his wife.

These have been the saddest and most painful days of this family’s life, and the only balance we can find for our despair is how perfect Dad’s life was.

Not perfect in the sense of untouched by pain or complications.

But perfect in the sense of complete. Resolved. Full to the brim with love and laughter. Bursting with youth and vitality. Overflowing with chaos. Every day offering some new reason to be proud of his children, their spouses, and his grandchildren. Every phone call ended with an I love you. Every three months offering some silly new excuse to bring everyone together for another family reunion. Every year increasing the intensity of feeling and love between family members.

And at the heart of this perfect life is a love affair that almost defines imagination. Dad and Mom were inseparable in the way schoolyard romances hope to be. It was as youthful and fun-filled as any of us has ever witnessed. The only thing that proved strange to us, their children, was their love increased when we left home. What gall.

We all worried about Mom and Dad moving to the Villages after we moved out, worried that they’d have nothing to so with all that quiet. Worried that they’d miss us.

But Mom and Dad threw themselves at each other . . . well, like two people who brought up seven children for thirty years. They threw themselves at each other so completely that the last years of Dad’s life were his happiest and most passionate.

There is no other way to say it: Mom was Dad’s everything.

Mom made Dad’s life perfect. Fully lived. Complete. Absent of any regrets. Desirable in all the ways it’s possible for people to desire.

This is why our sadness is mixed with joy. This is why in the days, weeks, and years to come we’ll think of Dad through tears but also with the purest kind of pleasure.

Because every one of us would love to live a life like that. Because life can’t be lived any fuller than Dad lives it. The imagination would have to burst to think that it could. Because to love, and be loved, like Dad was is to reach the limits of joy.