John's 75th Birthday

It is with great joy that I honor my father, John Heron, on his 75th birthday. It is so hard for me to believe that my father is 75! So often we ask ourselves where did the time go? You've been so many things to so many things to so many people you've lived more than one life time in your life.

Yes, Dad where did the time go?  First you were a loving son and dependable brother. Being one of nine children you had to find your place in your childhood family. You often joked that he who ate the fastest got the mostest and that we should excuse your boarding house reach. It certainly was challenging feeding nine kids and being resourceful enough to clothe nine kids. How does one fit into a family of nine kids, not getting lost or overshadowed by all your brothers and sisters. When your father died you dropped out of high school because your family needed you to. Your family always knew that they could count on you.

You've always been an entrepreneur, before you even knew the meaning of the word and before the word was known by the public. You got work on a milk route, delivering milk to peoples homes and office buildings.  Later on, you got your own route.  When you saw the writing on the wall you sold your milk route and moved on.

Lots of people have quit school over the years but education meant something to you, so you got your GED.  Your desire to learn brought you down the path of becoming a Journeyman Plumber. You and Mom would tell us how she helped you study for that test. Over the years you've learned about lots of things and you tried to pass on to your kids that an education was an important thing. You tried to motivate all of us to go to college (something that I did).  You learned about the stock market. You've taken a few courses that you always threw yourself into, because education was so important to you.

Nicole, Heather, and I were all blessed to have you as our father. I think that you and Mom did a good job raising the three of us! When Nicole and I were very litte you wanted to get us out of the hustle and bustle of the big city into an enviroment where you thought that kids could be kids, so you bought the house in Livonia. Later on you decided that you wanted fresh air and room for us to be able to run around safely, so we moved to Ortonville. The two of you did so much for us. Parents teach us many things and have such an impact on our lives. You did your best to raise the three of us, something you can really be proud of.


Living in Ortonville, presented some challenges. 10 acres meant there was a lot of grass to mow and a lot of property to take care of.  You spent so much time with the old Ford tractor, mowing the law and just trying to keep it running.  Mowing the lawn often took up the better part of a Saturday.  When it snowed you had to plow the driveway.  I remember you hitting golf balls in the front yard.

 Grandpa with all the grandkids (2005)

I remember you and Mom welcoming your grandchildren;.Caitlyn, then Jake and Dallas into the world, like it was yesterday. This was the beginning of you being a grandfather, later there would be Anna, Sarah, and Brenden. Mom, loved kids much that we all knew that she'd be a great Grandma, it seems terribly unfiair that she was only a Grandma for only 5 years. This also meant that you loved all of your grandkids for the two of you!   There probably aren't too many grandfathers who aren't brimming with pride over their grandchildre and who love them to death, but you took on the role of a grandparent very well and are greatly loved by your grandkids. With Caitlyn and Jake taking drivers training last Summer, so now you've entered into new territory again.

I remember you and Mom flying to Germany for Christine and my wedding. the wedding rehearsal was pure chaos and Mom asked if there would be heat in the church for the wedding the next day. I was so glad that the two of you were able to make over for my wedding.  I'll never forget that carriage ride through Rothenberg ODT or so many of the things that happened in the time that the two of you were there for the wedding.  I know that this trip meant a lot to Mom as she always wanted to go to Europe. You and Mom really welcomed Christing into the family, this has meant a lot to her.

Fortunately, you've been able to visit us in Germany a few times. I remember when you visited us a few months after Anna was born. You were here again when we had Sarah's baptism. You and Aunt Betty have visited us a few times over here and we've had some really good trips with lots of memories.  I loved gong to Scotland with you and Aunt Betty, meeting family and actually being in Scotland after hearing so much about your family's ancestrail roots over there, so this was a real thrill for me. We've been lucky enought to have some memorable trips when you've visited us on this side of 'the pond' I can still smell that stinky cheese you bought in the Netherlands and that we brought back home. I  remember being in that glacier at the Top of Europe, with the memorable train ride there, as well as taking the train to Lugano the next day. Remember when we drove to the see the Castle in Neuschwanstein and we were all surpirsed by the snow in Austria?

Anna and Sarah really enjoyed their visit last Summer.  They'll never forget that week at the cabin and all the nice trips that we took while we were there, including the incredibily hot day when we went to Mackinac Island. I wasn't with Christine and the girls when they were in Michigan in 2010 so I can't really talk about Anna and Sarah's visit then but I can say that their visit was very memorable and had quite and impact on them.  I really hope that we're able to have many more visits like that before they grow up.

I've often been impressed by how much people love and admire you.  So many places  we'd go, lots of people were always glad to see you. People like to have you on their side.  You're a good brother to your siblings.

You've lived quite a life so far.  Heres hoping that your journey has lots of more trips, visits, memories, and lots of time and opportunity to share with the people that you love.  Happy Birthday.

Grandpa with Aunt Betty and a few grandkids (2012)

In honor of Dad's 75th birthday, I've started a board on Pinterest, feel free to have a look and if you have a picture of John that you'd like to share, let me know. 

Sixth Anniversary of Nannette's Passing

September 11, 2007 marks the 6^th anniversary of Mom’s passing. As the days have become years and time continues to march on, the pain and sadness associated with my loss and out loss becomes less and less and we don’t think of her as often as we did, life does go on. A while back Christine told me how after her father died that while all the pain and feelings she felt weren’t fun, the intensity made her feel close to her father and remember more. That is something that has stayed with me. Of course we all know that time heals all wounds (or so it is said) and that the intensity of our loss can’t stay as strong as it was.

After Mom died, I thought of her very often. In our culture men are discouraged from crying and often from showing their emotions. In this sense I have always kept a lot of things to myself and not really been overly emotional, not that I didn’t (and don’t) feel things, just that I don’t display it a whole lot. My point here is that for the longest time it didn’t take much to bring me to the verge of tears, maybe I even had a few, when something made me think of Mom. In the first few years after she died, this happened very often and now I find that it doesn’t happen so often.

Music has always been a big part of my life, I think that this goes back to when I sang Don McClean’s “American Pie” non-stop on our cross-country family trip to Phoenix for Aunt DeeAnn’s wedding. When Anna-Katharina was born I had my first experience where a song actually gave me goose bumps and brought tears to my eyes. I had enjoyed Creed’s “Open Arms” for a couple of years prior to her birth but driving to the hospital after she was born and listening to it in the car, it suddenly had a whole different effect than it had in the past, now I was experiencing the song as a new proud father and related to it on a whole different level. Thinking further I remember how we all cried at Mom’s funeral when we heard the bag piper play “Brave Scotland”, but considering how funerals are generally sad and there are often people crying, maybe this isn’t such a surprise. For people that weren’t there it might be hard to imagine that scene, or maybe they can easily relate. Also at the funeral I heard Enya’s “Only Time”. I had heard that song many times before that and in fact Mom really liked her. After that anytime that I heard that song I would think of Mom. Before Christine and I moved to Germany, we visited Mom and Dad twice in Henderson. On our last evening we saw the Fountains of the Beligio and as the fountains danced for the last time in one of the sets we heard Andre Bocelli and Sarah Brightman singing “Time to Say Goodbye”. So this was us saying goodbye to Las Vegas, America, and to Mom. I have often thought of the day that we left Las Vegas that Easter time. I have never been someone that is big on goodbyes and I usually try to stop people from being sad, because in my mind it only makes saying goodbye all that harder. I was busy getting ready to leave and hadn’t really thought too much about the goodbye part and as we were leaving and I saw Mom at the door and how sad she was and then I became real sad. I don’t know if she was thinking it at that moment, but I believe that she was, that this was the last time that I would see her. At the time it hadn’t occurred to me that this was really the last time that I would see her. I think that in the back of my mind I was still thinking that I would see her again. I wonder sometimes if I had realized prior to that moment that this would be the last time, would I have done or said anything different?

I remember getting the call from Dad and he said that Mom wasn’t doing too well and that now would be the time to come. I booked a flight to Vegas but it wasn’t scheduled till the next week I believe. I was at work on September 11^th and Christine called me, she said that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center and that I should come home right then. I certainly had no idea about the gravity of the situation at that point and hadn’t seen the coverage on television at that point. When I was driving home I turned on the local AFN (Armed Forces Network) radio station and they were carrying the NPR radio coverage. By this time the second plane had hit. It was now that the magnitude of what had happened started to sink in. I walked into our apartment and Christine was waiting for me at the door. I had seen that she had been crying and was sad, but my first thought was of the planes hitting the World Trade Center. As she said that Dad had called, I sensed that she was going to tell me that Mom had passed away. Since the television was on CNN International, it wasn’t too long before I saw the awful footage that most of the world has seen at least once (in not a million times since then) and at that point the September 11^th Attacks and Mom’s death were now forever connected in my mind. There are many things that happen in life that we don’t understand and for which we believe that there must be a reason. Since Mom had been a nurse, it was somehow comforting to think that God needed her to help with all the victims of that day. For me every time that I hear September 11^th or 911, I can’t help but think of Mom. For the first few years, this event was mentioned so often and even now it is still spoken of quite often.

For much of my life I have been interested in writing and it is a way that I can express myself. For this reason I think that I have found myself drawn to blogging. While I would certainly like to think that what I have written is being read, to be honest, most of it probably isn’t, but that isn’t why I write. Giving myself the opportunity to remember Mom and just knowing that my words are in cyber space is comforting. Keeping this blog is one of my ways of keeping Mom’s memory alive.

The photos that I have posted are from Nicole and Heather's weddings in 1995. I recently scanned these in honor of this event. As we approach the sixth anniversary of September 11th, I hope that you'll join me in Remembering Nannette.

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