I Don't Know If One Should Talk About Death While Watching Football

So at these Game-watching events I organize there is a guy who's been a part of us for the last couple years.  He's a really cool dude, and I love his passion for his alma mater (frankly, it's outshone a lot of ours this trying Year).

Last Saturday, while we were watching our Game, he kind of dropped a bomb on me.  He called me over to where he was sitting and, while the Game was going on, told me his father died.  It was overnight from another Game we watched together a few weeks prior.  That Game kicked off so late, and the place was so crowded, that we decided to call it quits at Halftime.  He lives with his parents, but his folks sleep in separate bedrooms because his dad snores heavily.  Well, in the morning my friend was going out the door.  His mother was up and noted to him that she couldn't hear his father snoring, but he wasn't out of the house, either.  So my friend checked up on his dad and, well. ...

That is completely sad, no doubt.  From that point on during the Game, I was worried for my friend, as well as his mom.  My parents are getting up there in age, and I have had more than one night where I was afraid that one of them would go to bed one night and not wake up.  And it is because of my inordinate fear of that happening, which only ratchets up every night they make it alive, where I have to admit that I was completely damn flummoxed as to why in the world he would tell me this then.

He wound up his story on a ... well, let's just say an upbeat note: The evening before he went out to see the Game with me, he was talking to his father about it, so that is the last memory he will ever have about his dad, and it's about the college team he loves so much.  It's great he can see it in that positive light, but I can't.  If I were in his shoes, I wouldn't ... well, frankly, I wouldn't even bring it up.  Which raises the weird prospect of not telling anyone about a death in your family.  I may have told two people outside the family about my uncle's death in March.  On the one hand, I do find it kind of weird to not tell people.  After all, we all have family who die.  On the other hand, is there ever a good time to announce such an important event?  I could see it when you're not where you're supposed to be, like at work or even a party.  But short of that, there doesn't seem to be much need to call attention to it, and that would include watching a football Game together.  And once the death happens, well, life happens, so when would there be a good time to bring it up?

I am now bringing this back to me when it shouldn't be.  It's about my friend, who, frankly, appears to be taking it well, even though, if I were in his shoes, I would be devastated since this death was so sudden.  He'll be back this Saturday, and I will ask him about his mom and him.  Again, it's an important but grim subject, so I'll try and console him as much as I can during a football Game.