Showing posts with label legacy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label legacy. Show all posts

Saturday, June 19, 2010

Father's Day


When the immigration issues came to light in Arizona I found myself wanting to call my Daddy for his opinion. He lived just a few miles north of the Mexico-Arizona border outside the town of Douglas. He loved the Mexican people and traveled into Mexico often helping with a small community of Christians just on the south side of the border in a little town called Nacco, Mexico. My dad often handed out a little booklet published by Campus Crusade for Christ called "Would You Like To Know God Personally" sharing his faith even when a Highway Patrol officer stopped him for a broken tail light. That same officer was days later called to the scene of a fatal accident on Highway 91 at Grants Road where my father, for a reason we will never know, did not stop, t-boning another vehicle. The horrific accident took the life of a young mother, her mother and my father. As I walked the area of the accident, there in the dirt of the desert, was the booklet. Covered in sand I almost passed it up for discarded trash but quickly realized the dusty little booklet would become my Father's legacy. At his service, my sister and I had each page copied onto a larger page and gave it as a handout to each of the 300+ people that lined the standing room only service. My dad was not a hero, he was not even always an ideal father, but he was my daddy and I loved him....and I miss him.

Friday, May 28, 2010

Memorial Day

My, how time has whizzed by like a whirlwind since my adult children with children have informed us, the grandparents, of our duty and obligation to the annual getaway of the adult only children. To put it in a nutshell, it means we, that is the grandparents, get the opportunity, as my adult children remind me often, to babysit. Well the youngest is three so that is not really babysitting, but then again when you are approaching sixty, almost touching sixty to be exact, three years old is really close to being a baby. And so as the annual trip goes, the adult children gather together and plan for a year their adventure trip, reminding the grandparents, us, of how much fun they will have on this gathering of the brothers and sisters and how I should appreciate how much they like each other, as though that makes their plans easier to encompass for the grandparents, us, to embrace. Ha! It just makes me wonder if I truly can survive another of their annual trips of the brotherhood and sisterhood, because it means we, that is the grandparents, us, get the opportunity, there is that word again, to babysit the adult children's offspring. Don't get me wrong I love those little ones. They are a blessing to me and to my heart. They are fun and full of life. These children of my adult children light up my life and remind me of my legacy. However, and that is a very big however, I know how fully tired I will be and ready, yes very ready, to give these little ones back to my adult children when they arrive four days later. Without any regret, I will close the door behind them when they leave and collapse on the couch, a bittersweet smile on my face that the annual trip is over and yet a good time well spent for everyone!