There are a lot of days, nights, songs, places, people and events that occur in your life that you just never forget. Other things in your memory come and go but certain songs can place you back in time to a prom or a movie or riding in a car with a friend singing songs or maybe sitting in church singing the "Old Rugged Cross" which makes me think about my mother. Also, as I was cooking green beans this past week the smell was just exactly like the smell at my house on Rudolph Street on Sunday morning. I would wake up and immediately the smell of chicken frying and green beans cooking would greet me. Then, as a young girl, it meant nothing to me. Now, it means the world to me. A scene in my life that will always be engraved in my memory occured ten years ago today. A hospital bed with young women and men surrounding it, a very elderly lady sitting quietly in a chair in the corner and myself in attendance as we watched a most important man in our lives slip quietly away to his home in Heaven. I can remember the way the sun was making little patterns on the wall. I can remember the way the covers on the bed lay smooth and cool. It was a sweet, sweet very silent time for all of us. This man, my husband of 46 years and my sweetheart for many more, was the most unique person I have ever known. He was handsome, kind, loving, argumentative, opinionated, forgiving, trusting and trustworthy, intelligent, hard-working, fun loving and fun to be around, full of humor and humorous sayings that are remembered by all of his family ("if you can't take it just hold your hands up and say I Can't Take It"), and probably the most important of all was that he loved his family with a fierce love that never waivered no matter the circumstances. I think that the song that says "I've been up and down and in and out and over and around and every time I found myself flat on my face, I just jumped right up and got back in the race" describes the way he lived. He never gave up. He fought with everything that he had to live as long as he could in order to keep on being the husband and father and friend that he wanted to be. He left us in body ten years ago today, August 6th, but he is with us as much today and will be with us in the future forever. This is my tribute to Billy.
Life is a mixture of living and dying and as some of our loved ones leave us new lives come to us and we are blessed with wonderful, adorable, beautiful children. Emily and Jackson are going to have another son in December and Chris and Ashley will have a child in March. It is hard to imagine that I will have 12 great-grandchildren by Spring of 2009. I look at each one of these children and can see that they are going to contribute greatly to the family and to the world in which they live. They are healthy, happy, beautiful children who will grow into wonderful adults because they are all being reared in homes where God is given first priority and where love abounds. This is what life is all about. As I say every day I am just one lucky woman and God is good!!!
