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Read part three
read part four

We got back from my parents' house last night and things with my mom can get very frustrating. There are days that I don't think that I would mind moving a continent away from my mother and Saturday was one of them.

But also on Saturday, we let my daughter drive to the cemetary (the world is NOT ready for MissManda driving). Within a "stone's throw" all of my immediate family on my dad's side is buried. My dad, my daughter and I walked around for about an hour. Most of the people Manda had never met, but one that she does remember is her dad. In 2002 we planted a couple of arborvitae and one of them is growing faster than the other and she's concerned about that.

My grandparents' first four children all died before number 5 was born. This was in the early 1920's and they died of things like dehydration after influenza, appendicitis, a bowel obstruction. My dad was next to the youngest of nine, so he never met these siblings, but every year he takes care of their graves.

Two more aunts and an uncle, my grandparents, both sets of great-grandparents are buried nearly in a row. My dad's cousin (Ruth) cut my hair when I was a little kid. My Great-aunt Mabel loved books, that's what I remember most about her. My favorite "aunt" was actually a Great-aunt, Susie and she is there.

My closest cousin's "other grandpa" is buried right there also - there is a double gravestone and 30 years later his wife is still alive, seeing her name on the stone every time she visits.

Very close, a distant relative is buried - the husband died first and there was another double grave-stone with his wife's date of death left blank and next to that is another grave where the second husband of the wife is buried. She has outlived them both.

This was a good trip for me to make - I'm looking forward to this "anniversary of endings" and this is where the ending ended.

So I remember more of that ending...

On April 22 of 2001 I had written on another forum, in another place, "my brother had been out of the church for 20 years and didn't want anything to do with it. I chatted with him on line this morning and he said things like" God is in control, you just have to trust him" and "I've been watching you, don't give up now."

At this point, he is a fairly regular church attender and his family was in church with us yesterday.

On April 23, five years ago, I had written, "12 hours later, lots of questions and none of them answered. They took several "swipes" through Art's liver and took several samples. the pathologist in the rooms said that he saw cells with "inflammation" but couldn't say that he saw any cancer cells. So they sent them to the regular lab. They say "atypical" cells, but couldn't say that they saw any thing they coud say looked like cancer. Possible tumor outside the liver, pockets of fluid inside the liver (possible infections). We should have results tomorrow afternoon. His hemoglobin was low and they gave him 2 pints of blood"

We had no clue what was in store, still clinging to the hope that was held out.