You Have One New Message

Last week my I had a voice mail come through on my cell phone and it was an old voice mail I had saved that was about to be deleted. It was a message my grandmother left me with the information about my aunts flight when she was flying in for my dad's funeral. It was so weird listening to that message. I could hear my sisters and their kids in the background at my mom's house. Those few days right after my dad died were so.....sigh.....I don't know. Crazy. 10 million phone calls. 10 million people. 10 million things to do. Running on no sleep. Hearing that message and remembering all that went on in that time, it was like a dream. Like it wasn't real. Like it didn't really happen. It was kinda weird.

I found this video on my mom's flip camera. I took it the weekend before my dad passed away. That was the weekend we were having our kitchen floor sealed and our house smelled so bad so we spent 2 nights at my parents house. This is a video I took one night. I am glad we spent that weekend with them.




I keep thinking about the day my dad died. It was a Saturday. My grandma was in town. We had friends in town who were staying at my parents house. We were going to go up and spend the day visiting. The week before had been so crazy. We had so much going on and we were all running in different directions. When we were getting ready to start getting all our stuff and kids together to go up to my parents house, I started thinking that maybe we should stay home. I was tired, didn't feel like loading everything up, Steve was actually home all day, and we were going to be going to my parents house the next day for Sunday dinner anyway. My head kept trying to talk myself into staying at home, but for some reason my heart kept trying to push me out the door. I didn't want to deal with making the decision any more so I asked Steve if he thought we should just stay home. Steve is a homebody who isn't at home all that much. Usually when given the option, he will opt to stay at home. He thought about it for a minute and said, "No, Let's go. Let's just load everyone up and go." It was strange to me that he said that because that wasn't the answer I was expecting from him. I told him I kept trying to talk myself into staying home because it would just be easier than loading everyone up and I was tired because I had had a long week. I said even though I keep trying to convince myself to stay home, there was something in me that just wanted to go. He said he felt the same way.

So we went. And we had a very good day. My dad was in such a good mood that day. We enjoyed our time with him. I am so thankful that we were able to be with him, just hours before he died. I am thankful my children were able to be with him on his last day on earth. I am so thankful for the still small voice that kept prompting Steve and me to go. I am thankful that we listened.