2007 - Death of April in the Grand Canyon

Austin Graduating 8th grade

8th grade graduation
with Favorite teacher and best friend

In Washington DC

Austin's 8th grade trip to DC

Greg, Austin, Dixie and Emerson

Emerson

2007 Card

Merry Christmas 2007

Dear Friends,

Those of you who received a card from Lynn Erickson last year have seen this poem but I loved it too much not to borrow it from her letter.

A CHRISTMAS POEM

author unknown  (Since I have found this online - one says it was written by Helen Steiner Rice 1949 another says other people and most have the first verse the same but variations in the following)

I have a list of people I know

All Written in a book

And every year at Christmas Time

I go and take a look

And that is when I realize

a Christmas Poem

That those names are a part

Not of the book they're written in

But of my very heart

For each name stands for someone

Who has crossed my path some time

And in that meeting they've become

A treasured friend of mine

And once you've met some people

The years cannot erase

The memory of a pleasant word

Or of a friendly face

So when I send a Christmas Card

That is addressed to you

It's because you're on that list

Of folks I'm indebted to

And you are one of many folk who

In times past I've met

And happen to be one of those

I don't want to forget

And whether I have known you for 

Many years or few

In some way you have a part in

Shaping things I do

This, the spirit of Christmas, that

Forever and ever endures

May it leave its richest blessing

In the hearts of you and yours.

page 2

Aunt April and Uncle Vince
starting the hike that she died on

2007 will go down in the history of our family as a year of change and sorrow as well as joy.  The overwhelming sorrow was, of course, the death of April.  Never again will the world be as safe or filled with certainty.  How can we express the changes that take place with the loss of the one person we knew who was always right?  I miss her.  Greg's sister, the boys' aunt, and I never realized how much she meant to me until she went into the Grand Canyon in May and died of heat exhaustion.  If I never realized, of course I never told her.  Every time I think I'm done crying. Surprise!  I'm not.  Even the sight of a "Grand Canyon State" license plate on a strange car can make me break down in tears.

The Start of the Hike in May 2007

Anyway, Life goes on, but maybe it doesn't have quite as many cookies at Christmas, or goofy cards during the rest of the year.  There have been other, less devastating losses, like my job at the Catholic School.  I am back subbing.  I love subbing more but miss the predictable, regular paycheck.  Greg also lost his extra class period so that was another $7,000 less a year.

Still, the good finds its way into our life with regularity as well.  We got a wonderful visit from Greg's brother Matt and his wife, Andrea and their daughter.  Remi is too magical to define in a few words and it was delightful to have a chance to fall in love with her all over again.  We visited my Mom and Lance and Brett's family.  I am so blessed by my nieces and nephews.  And THERE is the balance point.  For every person our family loses, we have also gained several more.  It never fills the empty places left behind but they create new places of their own and keep the supply of love running high.

Emerson in 8th grade

The boys grow into men.  Austin called for a ride from high school.  I saw two handsome young men in mariachi style tuxedo jackets.  One was my son but I drove past until he rapped on the van window.  All I can say is Wow!  I'm the only one in the family under six feet.

Greg's second year teaching in Brookings, Oregon.  Some days he seems to love it and others he barely makes it out of bed.  He feels so incompetent for all the things the job demands and I know losing his big sister didn't help.  His students love him and so do we.  Going back to Wyoming in August let him get together with the Goode's.  We're hoping they all come here for the 4th of July on the beach.

My mom and Lance are living with change too.  My brother Brett took a job that has him living back east instead of next door and he travels a lot.  We all hope he's happy and yet I know Mom and Lance miss him a lot.  Typical spread out American family I guess.

Emerson loves 8th grade.  He still rides at Fort Dick Stables.  He's playing his fiddle in the preparatory Orchestra.  He's on Math team.  He loves anything Star Wars or electronic.  He started going to dances and had to put up with Mom and Dad Chaperoning.  He did rafting and rock climbing at a middle school adventure camp in Suttle Lake by Sisters, Oregon and is very responsible with his grades.  He's kind of nerdy cool and has good friends.

Austin in 9th grade

     Austin traveled from here to D.C. in June with the graduating 8th graders from Redwood School.  Then football camp in Gold Beach, Then Suttle Lake Camp.  He's slimmed down, grown up, gotten a girlfriend (Help!!)  He made it into Stage Band (Audition Only) and concert band.  This fall Stage Band starts at 7:15 AM but football practice ended at 6:00 PM. He'd come home, fall asleep and I never seemed to see him - hence the recognition problem!

We went to Vince's in Salem for Thanksgiving. Here at home for Christmas.  We may go to the snow on Mt. Shasta around New Year's but that isn't for sure.  What is for sure is life is always taking us by surprise.  Sometimes that is good and sometimes it hurt like hell.  But I'm so grateful that I get to spend my life with Greg and my boys and I'm grateful that you continue to be a part of our lives.

Double visit to Spencer's Barbershop

Tide pools at Crescent City

Me and My boys

San Francisco field trip

At the zoo

Remi at Ocean World

Willie and I

Another picture Mom?

Up at Howard Prairie Lake

Cousins in Cody, WY

Austin

Up in the Beartooth Mountains in WY/MT

burying Austin beside the Smith River

Painting the church Youth room

Del Norte Warrior football

Riding lessons at Fort Dick Stables

Austin and Uncle Vince

Emerson

Just me

Greyhounds at Christmas

Austin, center in Stage Band

Christmas at the Michiels

Traveling both directions to Go Home

My husband as he drops me off in the small Arcata Airport

 I wrote last, three weeks ago, to say that I was going to Virginia/Washington DC to visit my brother's home, where he had recently moved my Mom, who is showing scary signs of dementia and my brother (with Down's syndrome) to live with him after spending their whole lives in Cody, Wyoming

Well the trip was anything but smooth, but there were good moments and stories can be written from the adventures.

I got up at 4:45 and drove 90 miles to a small airport to get on a small plane and fly to San Francisco. Then catch a connection to my brothers in DC by 6 pm and see my mom and both brothers. 

NOT Exactly what happened. 

I got up at 4:45 and drove through the fog. The plane could not take off until after I was to have been on the 10:50 connection so I was reticketed for a 1:00 connection and we landed in San Fran right next to that HUGE wreck. Suddenly looking way more real than it had ON TV

The planes were all being delayed because the one runway was still covered in debrise and firetrucks and the 1:00 connection became a 2 and a 2:39 and a 3:00 before we boarded. Then we taxied away from the gate. 

And Stopped

And we're told that thunderheads from lake eerie to Florida were keeping DC busy enough they couldn't give us a runway so we were to go back into the San Fran airport for another 2 1/2 hours

When we finally were in a 757 flying to DC I sent my brother a text updating my arrival. When I hit send the phone died. He never got the message. I was in Dulles airport at midnight without my phone I don't know his number. 

Finally I got my suitcase and went to lost baggage and told them I was not losing a bag. I'd lost my brother. I begged the ladies in the office to let me charge my phone enough to call my brother and he drove to get me and we went to his house at 2 AM

The blue plane is landing where I had landed hours earlier. I took this shot from my plane that was stuck parked on the runway for a couple hours before departure to DC

 This is an urban area across the Bay from San Francisco but I don't really know which one.

My Brother at his new job

 Here is my brother with his new job. After 18 years at Walmart in Wyoming he is now learning to take care of the animals on a farm in Virginia.

He likes how Tall the trees are

The new hometown in Middleburg, VA

Mom and Lance

Mom's new room

 What you have to understand here, is that after years of taking care of her aging Aunts, Uncles and Parents, after being the caretaker of her husband of 36 years as he succumbed to cancer over a painful year and a half - After raising three kids, one with Down's syndrome, Mom had finally been unable to care for herself and my youngest brother any longer.  Not in full blown dementia, she still forgot details like paying bills, or treating her diabetes with respect. She forgot to take out the trash or the names of the people who lived in her town.  She hoarded her way out of her room and into sleeping in the living room recliner.  So for my brother to take her home and create a space for her probably saved her life.

Customer appreciation day at Middleburg bank

Mom and my niece's dog

Lance made me a Raspberry pie from the berries growing wild around their new farm

Cocoa Joe came from Wyoming with Mom, although she told their new vet he had never been to a vet before, and when the vet said, "Well who removed his one eye?"
She insisted, " I had it done at Walmart"

 Lance is getting into shape between his farm work and his evening workouts

Not only was my brother welcoming, but his girlfriend also welcomed us into their home and took us around town and fed and entertained us.

Smelling the pink Lilacs at the Red Lobster on a Lazy Sunday afternoon. 

My brother's son

my niece

 Here is my Mom and I and frankly I have seen a picture that looks like me, and I thought it was my grandma but the label on the back said it was my grandma's older brother in the stroller being pushed by a great-Aunt margaret - which is when I realized there was a woman with this face squatting by the river watching her kids throw rocks in the water, in front of their home cave millenia ago.

 One day we went into Washington DC to the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian

 I had to laugh at the tobacco growing outside, with no smoking signs interspersed

 Lance, who is resistant to change, and introduces himself everywhere as, "I'm Lance from Cody, Wyoming," was thrilled to meet my old high school classmate who works as an associate curator there now. How amazing to see someone else from CODY, WYOMING in his exile in this strange world.

My brother and his girlfriend. My heroes

 This is what Lance, at 38 years old has learned how to drive around as he feeds the chickens, horses, cows and longhorn bulls on his new job as farm hand in Virginia. He does miss Wyoming and Walmart but for a move he was given no choice in, he is adjusting well. Mom on the other hand is confused and frightened in her new reality but she has a lot of love around her.

This!  It was always 40* hotter in Virginia than back home in the Redwood Coast.

When I was a child I loved the TV show Daktari. The chimpanzee named Judy and the cross eyed lion were the best. So my best friends were these stuffed toys. Judy and The Unicorn. I drew this in my college art class in 1983 and Mom just gave it back to me.

 Mom gave me back the Drawing I had made of my Childhood best friends which had hung in her dining room for thirty years.

 I was supposed to fly out of DC at 5:44 their time and cleared security early and got to the gate to find that the plane I was to take was late arriving. Then when we boarded we sat on the Tarmac for 2 1/2 hours at first for weather then because the crew that pushes the plane away from the gate had been sent to another gate. I had only had an hour layover in Sacramento so I missed the connecting flight. Then i was there at 11:30 PM with a 6:32 AM departure but no way was I going to a motel if I just had to get up at 3:30 to catch a shuttle back here. 
I ended up sleeping on the floor in the airport quit room from 1:30-4 AM and the only other in there was a girl from Cheyenne Wy now who had been in my sons first grade in crescent city

The little plane I flew the last leg on was too small for the connecting bridge and only had 3 passengers but was the bridge that got me home 

So anyway my husband met me at Arcata at 7:32 this morning and we drove 90 miles home. Then I SLEPT