Saying Good bye

I am in good ol' Illinois/Indiana. (I slash them because we are actually on the border and go back and forth between the two states a few times each day. Jason and Kathleen live in Indiana. The funeral was in Illinois. You get the idea.)

My flight arrived right on time. Noon. My Dad and Mom were waiting for me with a rental car. They had come into Midway around 9am. We made it to the funeral home right at 1pm when the family started arriving.

As I write this, I am at Jason and Kathleen's -- my midwest home. I always stay here when I come into town. It's nearly ten. I've been up since 4four this morning. I need to go to bed. But I do want to say a few things. Some now. More later.

For now let me say that there were so many people there to pay tribute to my Grama. Fourteen of her sixteen grandchildren were there. Most of her nineteen great grandchildren were there with babysitters but a few were old enough to come. I talked to so many people. We cried a lot. We laughed even more.

On the way into the funeral home, I asked my Dad if there was going to be an open casket. I hate open caskets. He laughed. "Of course," he said. "We're Dutch. That's the what the Dutch do." In other words, it would be strange not to have an open casket. The good news is, Grama looked fantastic. She truly looked so much like I remembered her. Each time a member of my Mom's side of the family came in, I would escort them to see Grama. This was the time I cried the most. It was so strange that there were all these people there talking and hanging out and Grama wasn't talking with us. She would have loved to see all these people together in one room.

There were tons of pictures up at the funeral home. Pictures everywhere. There was a picture of JB and I with Grama at our wedding. And there was a picture of Grama with each of my boys. Lots of pictures of me and Grama. Some I'm not sure I had seen before. I was so blessed by that. There were also some of the pictures Grama had kept in her room at Bob and Mary's. One of the pictures included my Grama and a friend. The third woman in the picture had been cut out from another picture and glued on. I flipped the picture over. Grama had written details about the day. I guess these three ladies had spent the day together but had not gotten a picture together. So Grama decided to cut and paste them together. That's so my Grama.

Anyways, it was exhausting (1pm until 9pm) but incredibly healthy and happy celebrating such a fantastic woman.

I wanted to include a link to her obituary page. You can sign her guest book. You can also view a Slideshow of her life. It's a great slideshow. Really shows her life. It also has a few pics of my Grampa just like I remember him.

I also had the opportunity to read a history of her childhood that she had dictated to one of my aunts before her death. I got a copy. I hope to type it up and include it on the blog at some point. Grama had told me the story of her alcoholic father, her single parent mother, the man her mother "married" in order to have a place to live, that man's decision not to support her children, my grandmother moving in with friends and relatives throughout her young adult life . . . but it was so much more real to read it on the page. It's hard to believe she turned out like she did after all that turbulence.

Or maybe that's why she turned out like she did.

The one thing we all agreed upon today was that my Grama breathed her faith. It oozed off of her. It was her. You didn't get my Grama without Jesus too. She even wore a small band with a cross on it with her wedding band from the day Grampa died until the day she died because, "Jesus is my husband now," she would say. She truly walked with the Lord. I am so far from the woman she is. But I want to be like her.

All right, I must go to bed. I want to close with a post of Joia's. Joia took care of both my boys as well as her two children (yes -- that is four children under two and a half.) She took TONS and TONS of pictures (I couldn't wait to check her blog all day) and gave me such peace. The Lord is so faithful to provide us with just what we need in our time of need. Joia was that for me. Thank you friend.

Night all.