Tributes

[Blade]

We lovingly called him Pop. He was my father in law. The most gentle man I have ever known. He was very quiet and very soft spoken when he did talk. He didn't have much but he would give you the shirt off of his back.

He taught me so many things, that I guess I took for granted at the time. Thinking he would always be here, yet knowing at some point he would finally be at peace physically. We picked on him all the time about pulling his pants up, until he finally started wearing suspenders. He worked hard at his job and came home in the evenings and worked just as hard in the garden. On his days off he and I worked in the garden, picking and preparing veggies for canning. He loved his grandkids and took care of them all at some point. They loved Papaw as much as he loved them. They dotted on each other, and in his gentle voice all he ever had to do was say their name and they would settle down from whatever he was after them about. Occasionally he would "get you with his hat". That was his most stern correction with the kids.

Pop looked after his wife, and they went everywhere together. She didn't drive but he would cart her off to the mall and sit in the middle and wait on her to bring packages to take to the car. He helped her with canning to the wee hours of the mornings when the garden was coming off.

One of the funniest stories I always tell about Pop, was from many years ago. Twenty-five years ago there was no charge to carry off garbage to the dump. Some big doo daa took over the sanitation department for this county and decided we'd have to start paying to go to the landfield. Pop had a huge building, and he kept everything. He also let everyone he knew put stuff out there. Funiture, mowers, motors, clothes, everything you can imagine.

We decided to clean out the building before we had to pay at the dump. We filled up my truck and his truck and took off for our first trip to the dump. We got his truck cleaned out and started throwing stuff out of my truck and his wife turned around and caught him putting stuff back in his truck as we were throwing it out of my truck. She yelled at him, "PUT THAT BACK! WHY DO YOU THINK WE ARE HERE" "WE AIN'T TAKIN HOME MORE THAN WE BRUNG" LOL he chuckled his soft chuckle and said Moma somebody might need this stuff. She said well if they do they can go buy it, you aint takin it home. I laughed at them so many times.

Pop has been gone 14 months. I miss him, his gentle nature, his soft spoken voice, but mostly his love of his family and me.

[Kobi]

For my Grandmother, who always was and will always be the most important person in my life.

[Blade]

When I was a small child there was a thicket with a bunch of plum trees across the street from our apartment. I came out on the other side of the thicket one day and an elderly lady was getting her paper out of the box. She began talking to me and we fell in love I think that very minute. She and her husband didn't have any kids of their own, but had great nieces and nephews around my age.

Mrs Ross was diabetic, of course I had no idea what that was at 4 yrs old. I'd go visit Mrs Ross several times a week and before I left she would prop her feet up on a little stool and have me rub lotion on her feet, they were so calloused and crusty from the diabetes. I'd wash my hands and she'd give me a piece of candy and sometimes a dime and I'd be on my way home before the street lights came on.

I went to visit her one day and she was in her back yard raking leaves. We chatted a bit as she raked then she gave me the rake, telling me she would be back in a bit. I don't know how long I raked, but when she came to the porch and called me to come in, the closer to the house I got the better I could smell her homemade cookies, cooking. Yup she gave me some milk and cookies for raking for her. The next day I made several trips with her small wheelbarrow and dumped the leaves at the back of the property. She gave me a whole quarter for that, and I'm sure I lotioned up her feet before I left and got a piece of candy.

She didn't always pay me for doing things for her and Mr Ross, but she always thanked me graciously. They would talk and tell stories of "the old days". It was likely here that I learned to listen to and enjoy the elderly. Not just listen but really hear what they are saying. They also are credited along with several other adults in my younger years, of teaching me that you don't always get paid to do things for people, there are many times you just give of yourself, even if it's only a foot rub or listening and you don't expect anything in return.

Even after we moved across the river and I got old enough to drive I'd go see Mrs Ross. Mr Ross had died many years earlier but she stayed at the house and even in her 80's would take the city bus to church or to town. I don't know that they ever owned a car. She taught me kindness and gentleness and so much more.