Jamie and Kaitlin met us
in church, and we all sat together. For
lunch, we went to Jin Right’s which was a Sunday afternoon tradition. Paul had to go back to Athens, so he rented a
car and went home after lunch.
Later that afternoon, we
all went to Jekyll Island because Dad wanted me to take some pictures with my
camera. The first place Dad wanted me to
take pictures was a section of the beach that had low lying majestic oak trees
everywhere. He wanted me to peer through
the trees and take a picture of the lighthouse on St. Simons with the trees in
the foreground. We went to the other end
of the island to have a picnic near where there was a shipwrecked shrimp
boat. We took a lot of pictures, had a
nice picnic, and took some more pictures at sunset.
Lauren has become very
attached to Claudia and wanted to basically spend every waking hour with
her. Claudia wanted us to spend time
with Dad and did not want to take away our time with him. I keep inviting her to do things with us
because it did not bother me. We made
divinity at Dad’s house and amazingly so it did not bother me either. I know I have people praying for me this week,
and it helped a lot.
On March 13th (the
anniversary of Mom’s death), I prayed for the Lord to take control of my
emotions and to help me. I did not cry
at all on the anniversary but did get tears in my eyes as I found things around
the house which reminded me of her. I
have not forgotten her.
I spent a lot of time
talking with Dad on the anniversary of Mom’s death. We were at the beach and talked about
everything. I told him about my dream. He asked me if I was ever in Winn Dixie or
the grocery store and thought I saw Mom.
I told him no. He told me he
would be in Winn Dixie and thought he saw her, but when he got closer, it was
not her.
He also told me about
Mom deciding not to get a trach. I had
never heard this story. He told me after
Mom had her operation they went to the doctor’s office (to see about getting a
trach). After about fifteen minutes, Mom
was ready to leave. Dad told her to listen
a little while longer. He said they
would have had to take out her voice box(?) and she did not want anything to do
with that.
After we had been
talking a while, I looked at Dad’s watch.
It was 2:35 p.m. Mom had passed
away at 2:30 p.m. Around this time, Dad
got a phone call from my cousin about Aunt Jackie. The cancer was clear in her lung and trachea,
but the cancer was all in her brain.
Aunt Jackie was on her way down to visit with Granddad and Grandma
Freddie in Macon for a few days. She
then wanted to spend St. Patrick’s Day in Savannah, and come to St. Simons for
a few days.
The doctor called them
when they were in Macon. He told her the
news and told her she needed to come back to Ohio. She asked if she could stay a few days
because she wanted to see Grandmother.
The doctor told her if she could start chemotherapy in Georgia she could
stay. Insurance would be a mess, so they
had to go back to Ohio. I told Dad to
offer my assistance if they wanted me to tell Grandmother for them. At first they said no. The next day, they wanted me to tell
her.
I prayed before I went
over to Grandmother’s house because I knew she would be upset. When I got there, she was still in bed. She said she had not slept well because she
was up thinking about Mom, Jackie, and Johnny.
I told her that was the reason I was there, and that Jackie not going to
be able to come down. I told her all the
details I knew. She was upset, but she
is a very strong lady. She had a few
tears but did not cry. Dad knew he
needed to take her to Ohio, so I told her he was checking on airline prices or
whether they should drive. We talked for
a while. She said before Mom passed
away, she told Mom she loved her, and Mom said she loved her too. She ended up getting a one way airplane
ticket to Ohio to visit Aunt Jackie for a while.
While at a restaurant getting
ready to eat lunch, Dad was inquisitive of why ......... was upset. I told him the three things: they expected him to fill Mom’s shoes, they
placed higher expectations on him, and they expected him to come visit them. They were upset because they thought Dad was bar
hopping instead of seeing their family when they were in town. I tried to tell them differently; he was
meeting with friends at night.
Wednesday and Friday
nights he met with some buddies. Some of
the guys brought their wives. He had
been doing this before Mom passed away.
Dad told me to try to square everything up.
Joann and I talked one
night about Dad getting married and how it could affect us. Our family times, especially around the
holidays, are very important to us.
Luckily, Claudia is a good Christian woman and a positive influence on
my kids. The opposite scenario could
have been a woman that would have a negative effect on Dad and my kids.
U
Is the loved one looking at the very big picture
of seeing whether their significant other will have a positive influence on the
family and grandchildren? Are they
interested in someone that wants to bond with the family? (They may have to choose between the new significant
other or their family.) U
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