Patriot's Day, celebrated primarily in Massachusetts and Maine, is a festive state holiday steeped in tradition and centered around the Boston Marathon.
Prior to arriving in Boston in the fall of 1983 to start my first semester at Northeastern Univerity, I don't believe the uniquely New England holiday known as Patriot's Day was something that I was even aware of.
But in spending five consecutive spring seasons in "The Hub," it became a welcome part of every academic year, a three-day weekend that arrived soon after the cold winter was yielding to warmer temperatures.
All non-racers approach the third Monday in April with a different slant. Some observers prefer to encourage runners struggling to navigate through Heartbreak Hill. Many a participant has said that the enthusiastic crowd in this area near Boston College gives them the drive to persevere during the toughest stretch of the race.
Others await the winners crossing the finish line near the Prudential Center -- 26 miles and 385 yards from the starting point in Hopkinton, Mass.
Still more just sat at the bar of the now-defunct Eliot Lounge on Massachusetts Avenue as weary runners made their way in to celebrate the accomplishment with a glass of beer on the house.
I preferred the daily double of an unheard of 11 a.m. start to a Boston Red Sox baseball game at Fenway Park followed by an afternoon watching the end of the Boston Marathon.
Prior to 2007, the race started at noon. If you got a quick baseball game, you could watch nine innings and still make it to the finish line to catch the winners. Even if the timing didn't work out, you could still hear the roar from Kenmore Square as the leaders made their way through the final stretch of the race.
Like the Beanpot Hockey Tournament in February and the Head of the Charles regatta in October, the Patriot's Day events and festivities are woven in to the fabric of that community and make Boston one of this country's special places.
It is hard to say what impact the bombings on April 15, 2013, will have not only on the Boston Marathon, but also on other similar events.
How do you police a 26-mile marathon route?
My youngest niece was scheduled to visit Boston on Wednesday as part of a three-day student council trip with middle school students in the East Penn School District.
Sadly, that trip is now canceled.
I will make the 300-mile trek north to my adopted city twice this year. Once for a pair of Red Sox games in June and again in October to celebrate the 25 years that have passed since I graduated from Northeastern.
While I will feel safe on these trips, I get the sense that the third weekend in April will never have the same vibe as the spring days I enjoyed as a 20-year-old college student.
It will probably be the same feeling I get when I travel to the southern end of Manhattan where I once did consulting work on Rector Street and used to meet a college friend for lunch in the Marriott lobby at 3 World Trade Center.
Fond memories mixed with melancholy.
Kyle Clauss, a 2011 graduate of Nazareth Area High School who is currently a sophomore at Boston University, was quoted extensively in a story about Lehigh Valley residents impacted by the bombings.
I don't know Kyle, but he appears to have embraced his first 18 months in Boston with the same zeal I did 30 years ago.
Kyle's last twitter post on Monday, summed it up in four simple words:
"I love you, Boston"