an effort to catch up & things to ponder

My Papa with us, the grandchildren (but one was missing). Heather, we missed you.

We celebrated my Papa's 80th Birthday on July 26th! I can't believe it. He is 80!

He doesn't look it and surely doesn't act 80 to me. This is picture of him with his cousins....they came from two different states to celebrate with us! (New York and Alabama)

We had a great time. There were a number of people he'd not seen in a long time who came to celebrate and that was fun. There were a lot of other people none of us had seen in awhile. Some of the people there were people that Papa had no idea were coming, he'd not seen them since his days at Eastern Airlines and he was happy to spend some time with all of them. We had nearly 65 total I think.

We all got to see Aunt Nan and Uncle Jimmy from Perry (my Grandma's brother and sister-in-law). I'd forgotten how much I miss them. They brought a CD of the Mincy family that I watched later. We also watched a picture CD of my Papa and his life. These two things reminded me of a lot of things but mostly of how fast life goes by. How I really should stop and take time to be with the ones who matter most and how all of my "good intentions" don't mean a thing unless I act upon them. How life is not a dress rehersal...I only get one chance and it does go by quickly. How what seemed as though it should have been "just yesterday" I was a small child spending summer afternoons at the beach with my tall, dark and beautiful Aunt Jeanine (she still is); I was the little girl who was afraid to go out the chicken coop at Grandma and Papa's alone because of the "big scary thing" (a racoon) that was terrorizing the baby ducks and chicks & ME!; How when my Mom and I left Grandma & Papa's I would stand on the seat of the car in the middle waving and crying all the way down the driveway because we were leaving and my Grandma would stand there the whole time waving and telling me how much she loved me; how we were just shopping for school clothes for me and now, this week, I am getting ready to shop for them for my little Sutherlyn who is going into the 2nd grade; How the tall, handsome young man in the pink stripe shirt, my cousin Brent, was a "baby on the way" who we were having a "baby shower"for & the other nice looking one in the green, Blake (my other cousin), was a very small baby boy who on Christmas Eve nearly 23 years ago, we were visiting in the NICU at the hospital wondering and praying for things to turn out for the best.

Those are a few memories from what "seems like yesterday" yet I look at each person here, all of them, me included and my Mom and my Aunt and my Papa and I see, there in full color, that time has gone by, even if in my mind it seems "like just yesterday". We are all moving on, growing older and time is slipping away.... I know that I am not the first to realize this and certainly not the first to ponder it. I just want to be sure that I don't miss a thing. I don't want to look back on my life and wish for the most part that I'd done things differently. I know we all have those moments, there really is no getting away from them, We are human and we are imperfect. But I do want to be sure that I have done my very best to cover all the bases, the dot all of the i's and cross all the t's. To spend time doing the things that matter, with the people who matter for what matters. I hope that my family knows that no matter how quickly I come to see you and leave to get home, and how fast I seem to hurry you off the phone on occasion that I do love and cherish you. And so Papa, I hope that as you turned 80, you feel as though you have had a life well lived...a life of few regrets, a life full of love, happiness, fulfillment, joy and family. I know I feel that I have been a part of that with you. A part of what has been and is a wonderful family. I love you very, very much! All of you!

Happy Birthday Papa....I love you.