A SADNESS IN OUR FAMILY TODAY

Our darling daughter-in-law, Nurse Giggleswich, married to our son, Lord Bumhampton lost her father today. He had leukemia and was waiting to see if the chemo was successful so he could have a bone marrow transplant. A bacteria, or perhaps it was a virus, invaded his compromised immune system and antibiotics couldn't save him. He was only sixty-three. As you can imagine, she is devastated. We all are.

Her father wanted to live. He has grandchildren that needed to have more of his generous love. He has three other children, our daughter-in-law is his youngest child and she has no children, yet.

She was his baby--the baby is the favorite in many ways and our son says that she was her dad's favorite. He's sure of it. I can write that here because her siblings don't know about my blog and so will never read it. I don't know why kids want to be the favorite. They are all the favorite anyway for so many reasons and just because.

When she does have children they won't get to sit on her dad's lap and listen to him read the picture book he wrote, illustrated and self published. They won't get to have the treats he might sneak to them when Momma's back is turned, they won't get to giggle together about it. They are going to miss out on his laugh and his jokes and his hugs. They won't get to hear all the hilarious things he said, right out of the blue. They won't get to listen to his history, stories his kids didn't even know until today. One was about how he earned a purple heart in Vietnam and then threw it in San Francisco Bay when he got home because he was unhappy with the government .

There is more tragedy in our sweet girl's life. She lost her mom to cancer ten years ago. She was only eighteen at the time. A teenager who perhaps had to grow up faster than she might have.

Our girl is putting herself through school, has her LPN and will get her RN in a year, maybe a bit longer. She will graduate from the university this fall in Family, Human and Consumer Development. She has been supporting herself long before she and our son got married. She has worked her way through all her schooling.

She works full time in a care center, taking care of people who outlived her parents by twenty, thirty, or more, years. She has a generous and loving heart, giving care to those who cannot care for themselves. For instance, last year she took boiled eggs and Easter egg dye into work because one little old woman didn't get to color eggs when the rest of the little ladies did, a few days before. That's the kind of person our girl is, going beyond what is expected, working harder than she has to, being better just because she thinks it's the right thing to do.

So, we are sad tonight. Sad for our daughter-in-law and son, sorry for her siblings and the grandkids. We are sorry that the children our daughter-in-law will have will only have one Grandma and Grandpa to love them. We will try to do an extra special job to make up for all they will miss from their other grandparents. We won't be able to do it good enough, but I hope we can help.

I will encourage her to remember and tell her children everything she knows about her parents so her children will feel close to them. I wish I knew more about our girl's parents so I could help with the memory keeping. I am going to ask her things and remember so I can tell the future grandkids about the rest of their heritage, all about her parents because they were wonderful people and because their heritage is a good one.