April 5, 2021 – The Furthest We Ever Traveled

         As I read the Memory Question, I contemplated what the answer could be in my life.  There are many ways I could answer, I decided as I consider what a journey could be.

Our journey began on February 1, 1952, when Ed and I said I do, and we left on our honeymoon.  Our honeymoon trip was not to an exotic location but to the beach at Galveston, Texas.

It wasn’t the location that interested me, but remembering my parents honeymooned there on the Beach at Galveston. They slept on the Beach in 1928.  I was thankful we found find a small motel.  It was a seashell ‘heaven’ for me, I had never been to a beach before.  We began to learn to live in tandem during that trip and this became our journey.

We didn’t travel except to visit our parents in Oklahoma and in Missouri. We quickly were blessed with four children and thought little about traveling far from home until our children grew older.

The first seven years we lived in various places from Kansas to Missouri, to Indiana, to Oklahoma to Illinois.  And after our grown children left home, we moved to Arkansas.  Is this where our children learned how to be free spirits?

Before we married, I didn’t write a ‘bucket list’ of places to travel. Ed spent two years in the Air Force after high school, stationed in the Marianna Islands. He didn’t tell me very much about his time in the Air Force.  However, he did tell his story to his cousin-in-law, Ernie Frazier.  Ernie Frazier included Ed’s Story in Volume One of The Boothill Coffee Club.  He gave me permission to copy Ed’s Story on my website – Emilys-Snippets.com.

One year we decided to visit our son and his family in Warroad. Minnesota. We could see a curvature of the water on the horizon between Minnesota and Canada. After the joy of visiting, and beginning our trip back to Arkansas, we saw signs directing us to Canada.

Ed idly wondered aloud, what would happen if we just crossed the border into Canada so we could say we had been out of the country. We drove back to the United States side.  Just in case you wondered, the air smells the same on both sides of the border.  We were thankful to return to United States. We made other trips to Illinois, Georgia, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and California to visit our children and grandchildren.

After sixty years of marriage, I noted that Ed began having difficulty remembering details. One day, he decided not to write check anymore.  He let me drive more often, too.

One Sunday morning, he decided to drive home after the first service. Since I played piano for another service, I couldn’t go.  I just prayed for him.

After the service, and I found a ride home, I asked him how it was to drive.  He handed me his car keys and gave up driving. He told me that it frightened him when he repeatedly hit the curb.  I began making the decisions that needed to be made and not rely on him.

The decision that would change our lives came after the diagnosis of Lewy Body Dementia.  I still remember sitting in a small room, thankful for the peaceful painting on the wall as I waited to hear the doctor’s findings.  His diagnosis changed many things.

We would need help from one of our children.  We chose Tim in Illinois. We needed to sell the house and leave our church home in Rogers, AR for 38 years.

Anna came and helped pack the pictures and paintings, Tim came to tell me to think down-size. Then came a flurry of packing and showing the house and wondering what lay ahead.  The sight of so many boxes containing the remnants of our lives lined the garage.

All four of our children came to pack load the truck in September of 2012. We planned to leave the next day. I found Ed sitting on his bed looking bewildered. I gave him an empty box to pack. I asked him to choose what he wanted to take from his room.  I went back to check in an hour, and the box was still empty.  He sat without moving or understanding my request.

Then we were ready to leave. Paul would drive the U-haul truck, and Tim would drive Ed and me to our destination.  I remember thinking one particular thing, as we drove away.  “Don’t look back!” That part of my life had come to a close, look forward to what lies ahead.

Tim and Karen bought a condo so we would have a place to move into.  It was small and just fit for our new life. Our children unloaded the furniture. The piano seemed huge as I watched my three sons lifting it. Tim’s Hilarie helped to unpack the kitchen.  I remember chuckling as I realized we were down to one drawer, leaving fourteen in the Rogers’ house. Later I wrote, One Drawer Life, https://emilys-snippets.comone-drawer-life/

We began making memories together here…That is when I learned that we were still on a journey and the journey would come to an end, but we were together.

Our son Dan died two years after we moved.  Time went on.  Ed enjoyed walking to the small pond near our home, and after four years, I fed him, read to him, prayed with him, protected him and after four years I realized I could no longer care for him alone even with the help of Palliative Care.

Tim and Karen found a suitable Memory Facility that would care for him. The most difficult part was not being able to see him for a week.  Many times that week, I read aloud this verse from Psalm 118:24, This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.

         It seemed years, and finally, the day came when I could see him again.  Our visits for the next two years were filled with older hymns, prayers, scripture and visits about Jesus and all the wonder of Heaven. We often held hands, particularly after he could no longer see, walk, or feed himself.

I learned that listening to old hymns calmed him and gave him peace. I could see his lips moving as he mouthed the lyrics.  When his granddaughter Jenny Payne recorded a song, I noted the change of his demeanor.

God gave us a long journey together, and we celebrated our Sixty-Sixth Year of our Journey together in the Illini Heritage Rehab home on February 1, 2018.

God called my Ed to the Presence of the Lord, a month later. The Furthest we travel, is to meet God for an eternity. What a blessing we have in Jesus.

Each evening on my way to sleep, I look for the stars and thank God for His Goodness and the Joy of being His.  One evening as I peered into the skies, I saw a crescent moon, and for just an instant, I thought I saw him sitting in the crescent. He swung his legs and waved at me. It was a gift…and I knew God was caring for my Ed.

He always loved to laugh with his children and had a sense of humor even in his last days. He loved his children, and his grandchildren made his day.  When the great grandchildren came the joy just compounded. Ed and I had many adventures, and he taught others by his gentle and kind spirit.

Soon, Ed and I will be together for an eternity! God is Good. And our journey will go on for an eternity.

Hyperlink for Edgar Frank Combs’ WWII story. – https://emilys-snippets.comfamily-combs/staff-sergeant-edgar-f-combs-2/