The Moments That Mold Us

All it takes is the sound of an ambulance off in the distance and I am thrown back to that morning in November.   I am standing in my room getting ready for school.   I hear the sound of an ambulance and somehow I just know something is really, really wrong.   I remember a cold chill run down my body.   It really scared me.   I didn't say anything to my family.   Finishing getting ready and the bus ride to school is just a haze, but I do remember praying a lot.   

I had barely entered the foyer of our junior high when I caught pieces of whispered conversations that were making their way around the clusters of students.   An accident.... It was bad...  Someone was hurt....    I searched out my friends.   When they turned around I could see tears in their eyes.   

"It is Lisa."

Lisa in her last school
picture 7th grade

Lisa... we had gone to school since kindergarten.  Tiny.  Petite.  Always smiling.  Quiet.  Shy. Soft Spoken.  Kind.  We all knew that her home life was full of struggle and abuse.  We saw it in her eyes, but she rarely talked about it. 

"What happened?"

Stunned I listened as they told me she had been hit by a drunk driver while waiting on the bus.   She was killed instantly.   A few minutes later the bell rang and our principal told us all to go to class.   All of us stared at each other like we weren't sure how to walk.   Of course now I know that we were in shock.   Somehow we made it to our first period class where a brief announcement was made about Lisa's death and then we were expected to go on with our school day as usual.    (Thank goodness schools handle grief in a much better way now.)


While I had been to the funerals of great uncles and distant relatives, going to Lisa's funeral was the first one that truly was so personal.    The sight of her in her beautiful crimson Christmas dress in her casket is forever etched in my mind.  


Fast forward 33 years...

Tuesday evening I receive a message from one of my friends letting me know one of our classmates had died.    The events surrounding his death were quite tragic.   While talking I can tell that he was very bothered.   In the course of our conversation he tells me that he was there the morning Lisa was killed.   He said he was on the school bus when the drunk driver went flying by them.   He said that when they came around the corner the car was on top of her.    Her parents were hysterical.  Her two sisters were standing motionless and in complete shock.    In his words the bus driver jumped up and began simultaneously praying and speaking tongues.     He and another boy (our classmate who had just died) jumped off the bus and tried to pull the car off of Lisa.    The wheels were still spinning.   No matter how hard he tried he couldn't get the car to budget.   What is imbedded in his mind is the site of Lisa's legs sticking out from under the car.   One black buckled shoe on and one off as if a grotesque reenactment from the Wizard of Oz.    He too remembers being ushered back on the bus where he was sent to school, given a pass for being late and then sent on to class and expected to go on with his day as usual.  


We shared a grief over 33 years old as we remembered that day when Lisa was tragically taken by a drunk driver.   We also grieved over the fact that our friend would so ironically choose a path for his life that led his life to be taken by alcohol as well.


Wise King Solomon wrote, “To everything there is a season… A time to weep...a time to mourn” (Ecclesiastes 3:4
).   

This week has definitely been full of those times.

Flashback Friday: Mammaw & Pappaw's House

(My aunt sent me some photos that she had found. This one is of me, my middle sister and my cousin. Why I was wearing nothing but my TG&Y panties, I don't know, but I am thinking it was probably summer and we were at my Mammaw's house. You know parents and their cameras. They will take a picture anytime. Ha!)

Mammaw and Pappaw lived in a little house. Three bedrooms. One bathroom. When we would go visit, we three girls would sleep in one bed in the back bedroom. We used to fight over who had to sleep next to the big scary window fan. The fan stayed on during the night to keep the rest of the house cool. I don't know why, but my sister and I were convinced that a boogey man could walk up, stick his hand through that fan opening and grab you.

During the holidays, that little house would be packed to the corners. That back bedroom was ours. All the girls would cram in there. We would play, talk, giggle and even eat. Mammaw would set up the ironing board in front of the bed and we would use that as our table. (Recently on a trip up to visit my aunt, she joked that she started to pull out the ironing board for the girls to eat on "for old time's sake".)

There were lots of other great places to play at Mammaw's house too. Pappaw had huge green apple trees. We would climb those branches as high as our bravery would allow. You had to be smart getting into that apple tree. One wrong move and you would accidentally step on the tin that covered Pappaw's potatoes.

We would walk out under the pine trees and pick up some rocks (or something) that wrote like chalk. Mammaw and Pappaw had the old home foundation from their original home. It was still planted with shrubs and flowers around it. We would play house on that foundation and used those rocks to draw off rooms and furniture. We could play that forever.

The best part of any visit would be going in to eat. My Mammaw was an amazing cook. My Daddy says he still misses her fried apple pies. She made the best butter beans too. We all loved her punch cake -- that is what I call it -- a cake she made and punched holes in and dripped delicious icing in. I remember one time when we were staying with her she made homemade biscuits and homemade syrup.

From Pappaw, I developed a lifelong love of Pepsi Cola. Every morning at 10:00 he would say, "I think I'll have a Pepsi Cola." If we were visiting he would pull out one more and split it for my sister and I. As you can see from the picture, my Pappaw was a tall, thin man. He wasn't much for sugar. He drank milk with all his meals and I never did see him eat but a taste of dessert, but he loved his Pepsi Cola.

Today, that great bed from the back bedroom is at my Mom and Dad's house. I love the way it squeaks and creaks when you sit on it. It reminds me of times spent with my cousins and nights whispering with my sister about how we hoped no one was outside the window.