Joseph Sylvester Madigan

   He got himself drunk for the holidays---those dreaded family-centered holidays.  Usually a taciturn man, he would express his scorn for his god.  He lived in a time of harsh reality when you dealt with the hand you were given: it was a time before social services or organizations or counseling groups to help you through your personal tragedies.  And Joe had tragedies.. His wife, Phoebe, died young.Their  only son and only child drowned at age 11 in the river near where he lived. He lost his arm in an industrial accident at the Powder Mills. So he came  to live, a broken man with nothing of his own, with his younger brother.
   He could not find regular employment, but did work from time to time as a painter, and even did wall papering. He loved kids, especially when they were little, and was kind to small weak animals, an advocate for the runt of the litter. He lived in a single room. He had nothing of his own. He presented as relatively cheerful, except for those holidays; Christmas time was the worst. He would remark that his wife bought their son, Joseph, to church every Sunday, and what did it get them but horrible suffering and death. He was angry at God for letting that happen to them and he could not find solace. And there was no one to listen or try to understand.
    After he died, in that solitary and sparsely furnished room where he lived out his life, there were no personal belongings to be found other than his few items of clothing,  only a bunch of religious cards and pamphlets filling a drawer of his small dresser.