If you’ve never attempted to jump a creek with a tractor, pedaled your bike across the USA three times before cell phones were a thing, or invested your whole heart into the joy and fulness of the people around you, your obituary will probably be way less interesting than this one. Robert Szuba, who for some reason had no middle name (in fact, all of his siblings lacked middle names… except for Paul of course… he got one), passed away on November 8, 2024, in Winchester, VA with his family.

Bob (or Rob… or Robby to Aunt Lorraine and Uncle Tony, as I recall – to me he was just Dad) had lived an adventurous, slightly nutty, love-filled life. As the Szubas reminisced in the hotel after his passing, we all realized that he made families wherever he went (which, admittedly, we all agreed sounded a bit too risqué to put into an obituary, but what’re you gonna do?). Bob treated all of his friends, acquaintances, and especially his patients, as if they were blood relatives.

Bob began his journey in upstate New York. Born in Syracuse at “St. Joe’s,” Bob was the second son born to Myron and Dorothy Szuba. Bob and Steve, his older brother, and Paul, born a little over a year after Bob, partook in many shenanigans over their years together. Steve says, “I will always remember, as Rob’s older brother by five years, the spring days when returning home from school when Rob would meet me at the school bus and would ask me what I had for lunch and what I did in baseball. I will also remember the many hours we would play catch together with him being the pitcher. I will miss him forever!”. The three brothers were thrown quite the curveball when JoAnn, their little sister, was born much later. JoAnn shares, “Baby sister ‘JoAnnie’ recalls Bob’s delicious Lemon Chicken (made with love and a whole bottle of lemon juice), acting as Bob’s real-life mannequin for his college anatomy class (still can’t get the permanent marker off my legs), and Bob’s throwing me into the scariest situation a 10-year-old could imagine that would eventually start me on the path to my life-long career and passion in Pediatric Nursing (iykyk)!”

From New York, where he graduated from Monroe Community College and the State University of New York at Buffalo as an Occupational Therapist, Bob then hopped on a bus to do an internship in Arizona. He worked at Phoenix General Hospital for 1-2 years while Paul and his roommates “freeloaded off of him” (a quote from Bob, so it must be true). He then moved to Southern California – Irvine for over two years. While helping a patient named Pat McCleerey, he met and fell in love with Pat’s sister, Lori.

After biking with his friend Bob Shneider from Southern California to New York and hopping a bus back to So Cal, Bob moved with Lori back to his childhood home in Red Creek, New York, and got married in Martville shortly after. In 1985, their son, Chris (your narrator, aka the Chosen One) was born, destined by God to became the author of this obituary. Bob and Lori lived in a house in Willard, NY, near Seneca Lake and the famous State Asylum for the Chronic Insane. I (remember, the Chosen One) spent the first eight years of my life biking through Willard with Dad, exploring the abandoned asylum grounds, skipping rocks with him on Seneca Lake, and jumping off of the massive three-tiered deck that he built on the back of our house. He saved me from a massive demon dog (it seemed to me, anyway) that chased us down a back road as the sun went down, clinging to his back as he pedaled his bicycle as hard as he could. Though Bob and Lori divorced in 1988, there were many happy memories in that house; years later, after meeting Allison Gentry, a music therapist who worked with Dad, we three moved to Virginia in 1994.

Before that move, it must be noted that Rob and Alli had an incredible, life-altering adventure in the summer of 1994. After Bob had pedaled from California to Wyoming in 1990 and then from Texas to New York in 1991, he and Alli travelled by bike from California all the way to New York. As Alli shares, “Between watching the sunrise over the Sierra Nevada Mountain range to seeing the Badlands with both of us down to one contact, the memories we made were like no others. The trip would not have happened without Bob and there is no one else with whom I would want to share that kind of adventure. Like him, it was one of a kind.”
For the next 30 years, Robert Szuba would work as an OT in Virginia, changing lives and helping people in their darkest hours. From rehabilitating stroke victims and people who lost limbs to assisting families in caring for loved ones struggling with dementia or paralysis, Bob invested everything he had into making sure people had the care and attention they needed. No matter what, he would always do the “right thing,” as Dr. Lee would say, regardless of the extra, unbilled hours or when something was “impossible.”

He didn’t just spend time with his patients, though. Bob prioritized raising me and spending time being an almost grandfatherly figure to my cousins. He would chase my friends and me around the house, making pig noises while brandishing a pig-shaped cutting board and throwing dirty underwear and socks, calling it “biological warfare.” He traveled up and down the east coast, making sure he was making memories with his family. Szubalympics, as they came to be called, was a tradition for many years where the Szuba family would all gather and compete in made-up games (and creatively-altered ones) for hours. Bob made sure he went to graduations, big events, and birthdays, always coming up with zany gift ideas.

For instance, as JoAnn shares, “Uncle Bob would spend many a Fall Friday night traveling to a North Carolina high school football field to watch his nephew play football and even offered to wrap a few players’ ankles with his sister while he was at it! He even broke Covid rules by sneaking into a locked school to surprise his nephew at his graduation.” For Brynn, my oldest daughter’s first birthday, Dad wrapped several gifts and used those gifts to create a giant “birthday cake,” complete with a single “candle” made out of a plunger! Of all the gifts Brynn had received that year, she played with that plunger more than anything else. And when my wife Kristy was giving birth to our second daughter Evelyn, he made pink and white sock puppets and encouraged everyone in the hospital waiting room to wear one.

Dad loved to challenge himself. He loved learning new skills and improving his surroundings. He would have “Bob Jobs” that would last for months or years because he’d insist on doing almost everything himself (with help from friends and family, of course). If he didn’t know how to do something, he’d set out to learn; most of the time he’d learn through trial-and-error rather than reading a manual or an instruction booklet… or he’d contact Brother Steve (remember, most of this was before YouTube or Google). These jobs would be his release, his vision, his legacy to leave behind him. I can’t wait to see what families, what kids, get to create epic games and lasting memories on all of the retaining walls and decks he has left for them to enjoy.

Throughout his life Bob became skilled in masonry, carpentry, landscaping, architecture, and do-it-yourself home solutions. He’d also push himself in sports; he studied Karate (Goju Ryu and American Freestyle), cycling, basketball, tennis, ping pong, whiffle ball (a serious Szuba Family pastime with many contentious “records” set in his childhood backyard), baseball, soccer, and frisbee golf (he would design his own courses for this, of course!). In addition to all this, he was also an incredible artist always searching for a new medium; he painted, turned wood, learned woodburning, sketched, and taught himself piano, guitar, banjo, paper mâché, sculpting… he also wrote many, many songs over the years, though he rarely, if ever, performed them.

Robert Szuba, a wonderful, creative, hardworking, disciplined, hilarious man, has left behind an incredible legacy. The following sums it up nicely (thank you Dr. Lee, Dad’s longtime friend and co-worker): “Bob always saw the good in people. He rooted for the underdog and would try to help those who needed help. He was always positive and uplifting no matter what the situation. He always tried to find a solution, a compromise, a way to solve the problem. He was a gentle and loving soul.” And I, we, will all miss him.

Preceded in death by his parents, Robert is survived by his son, Chris Szuba, daughter-in-law Kristy, and granddaughters Brynn and Evelyn, as well as his siblings and their families: brothers Steve Szuba (w. Kathy) and Paul Szuba (w. Marta) and sister JoAnn Sutterby (h. David), and many nieces and nephews and their children whom he loved like his own kids.

Celebrations of life will be held at a later date.

In lieu of flowers, please consider volunteering with or donating to your local chapter of the Salvation Army, any nursing or long-term care facility, or any hospital. After all, with Bob’s passing, the world has lost not only one of the most creative and innovative Occupational Therapists of our time, but also a kind, caring, fun and loving father, grandfather, brother, and friend.