Good Evening.

My family and I would first like to thank everyone for coming and all of those who helped make tonight possible.

A lot of love has gone into making everything happen. I must first mention and thank our cousin, Kevin McConnell for creating the website, www.rememberingchuck.com and I would encourage you to visit the website if you haven’t all ready and share your memories of Chuck on the blog.

My family would also like to thank Anthony and Andie for allowing us to use this wonderful space tonight and Steve, Andy and Al for putting this evening together.

We have tried to make this night a true celebration of Chuck’s life, filling the room with pictures of him and the music he loved. And just a little note on the music-it is all from Chuck’s CD collection-I had about 35 CDs to choose from and 30 of those CDs were Jimmy Buffet.

On November 20th, 2005 my family’s world was shattered with the loss of our father. On April 4th, 2007, the world stood still, with the loss of Chuck.

Chuck was a father, son, brother, grandson, nephew, cousin, friend, pilot, yachtsman, athlete and skier. Chuck loved the beach, the city, the mountains, the sky, the outdoors and five star hotels. He was known as “little Chuck”, “young Chuck”, “Chuck Junior”, “Chuckie”, “CJ”, “Sport” and “Ace”. “Ace” was my father’s nickname for him, usually in the context of a phone call saying; “What did you do to the car, this time Ace?”

My brother, sister and I were lucky enough to have parents that were married for 44 years and who loved each other as much on the last day as they on the first.

Chuck always said that we were taught friendship and loyalty from father and you are all a compliment to that.

Chuck also said, of our father, that the best thing he ever did for his children was marry our mother. Our parents have given us many gifts; a solid foundation and security to grow from, opportunity to follow and find our way as well as the gift of laughter.

For my brother, sister and I, our father was the greatest man we will ever know. And it is through he and our mother that we have been blessed with people in our lives who have impacted us both as children and adults.

Delaney was the first to mention that now Chuck was up with Popa, which she called our father, and Chuck’s favorite dog, George. And I know they are all together with our cousin, Jerry McConnell.

Jerry was my mother’s closest cousin, he was someone we have known since the day we were born, a man who introduced us to New York City and through him we learned to love it.

I know that my father, Jerry and Chuck are together doing what they loved to do. They are watching their video of the New York Giant’s 1986 Super bowl win against Denver, they are playing golf, watching a litany of John Wayne movies and I am sure Chuck has introduced to my father and Jerry the award winning docu-drama: “Girls Gone Wild”.

In addition, I imagine that Chuck is spending a lot of time explaining the philosophy of mixology, as my Dad and Jerry sip their scotch on the rocks, in disbelief.

Most importantly, I know they are watching over us-celebrating our successes, laughing with us during our times of joy and giving us strength during our times of struggle.

My father, Jerry and Chuck shared a lot of the same attributes:

  *they were passionate about their careers

  *they played as hard as they worked

  *they loved to laugh and make those around them laugh

  *they were devoted to their families and friends

  *and they all adored, our mother

Tonight, you will meet our family, Aunts, Uncles and a multitude of cousins-you will meet friends our parents went to college with, families we have known since the day our Dad joined Pan Am and friends we grew up with in Connecticut.

My brother, sister and I had a wonderful childhood created by our parents and in a large part because of the people in this room.

Chuck would be so pleased to see this group together, his relatives, family friends, high school and college friends and all his buddies he met along the way.

He would overjoyed that tonight, you will meet his daughter, Delaney, as she is his proudest accomplishment.

My brother fit 30 hours into a 24 hour day and 10 days into a 7 day week. Whether doing good or up to no good-my father always said: “Chuck could fall into a bucket of shit and come out with two new shirts and a date”.

We will all miss hearing his belly laugh when you told him something funny, his impression of an orangutan after a few beers and his crazy nicknames he had for everyone.

I had to go through my brother’s cell phone recently and for the record- my family and I are pretty sure who Big Sally and Craigle H2O are, but we would like to meet-Lemon boy, Geek Tony, Weezie and Bad Billy.

Our brother loved fine wine, expensive cigars, big toys and designer labels. My sister and I have always said-he was incapable of walking past a mirror without primping and that he was the daughter my parents never had.

In all seriousness, I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you what most of you all ready know and that is, my brother found his true love on October 31st, 2001 when “Delaney kid” was born. He loved being a father more than anything, she was the center of his world and the light of his life.

They spent a lot of time together having fun, in fact, Delaney is the only 5 year old we know that knows the lyrics to every Jimmy Buffet song ever written.

Although his time here was too short, he certainly knew how to live to the fullest-with this in mind I will leave you tonight with his own famous words…………….YEAH BABY!

Katy O’Connor, May 15, 2007