Carolyn's story
A story written by one of Jan's best friends...
We were just little girls, 11 and 12 year-olds
at the first ever Girl’s Camp at Harmony Hill in Fulton, MO. Two
little girls with our long hair slicked back in ponytails.
Neither of us were all that shy, both of us were in to music – she was
much more than I - , both of us wanted to be captain of our
group. She won. Maybe that’s why our “best friend” status
didn’t happen immediately.
But our next encounter came when we were 15 and 16,
once again at Harmony Hill Youth Camp. Now our hair wasn’t
slicked back in ponytails, but stacked high on our heads, hers always
bigger and more beautiful than mine. This time our love of music
brought us together. I knew how to sing parts as did she and that
began our lifetime of harmonizing.
I think harmony best describes our
friendship. Agreement, accord, synchronization are words the
thesaurus uses. That’s who we were. Through our teenage
years I never remember a fight, a conflict, or an argument. We
were best friends. We traveled hundreds of miles singing together
in trios, quartets, and choirs for our school, Mt. Zion Bible
School. We played hundreds of offeratories, she on the piano, I
on the organ. We had many all-nighters where we stayed up until
daybreak, talking, sharing, giggling. She dated my brother. I
married her neighbor.
We had similar life goals. We were both serious
about our relationship with Jesus Christ. We both wanted to marry
Christian men and spend our lives in Christian service. We hoped to
someday be mothers. We wanted to always be best friends.
We were married within 5 months of each other,
wore the same wedding dress, were each other’s maid/matron of
honor. We alternated being pregnant and between the two of us we
had 5 children within 5 years. Our kids called each other
cousins. When they were older they realized there was no blood
relation, but they, like us, learned that there are bonds that don’t
need blood to be strong and permanent.
Through the years there were times when miles and
life kept us apart for long periods of time. That didn’t separate
our spirits. When we did have the privilege of being together again, it
was as if we picked up with the sentence we had left off with the last
time.
Both of our families moved around a lot, and so
it was with great joy that we all landed in Ohio within the same
year. We lived less than two hours apart and found ways to get
together from time to time.. We scheduled times for our families
to enjoy ballgames and concerts and special occasions. We shared the
joys and challenges of parenting. We supported and carried each
other in the heartaches and tragedies that entered our lives; her
son, Roger’s, battle with cancer – which, thankfully, he won. My
son, Ryan’s unexpected death at the age of 19. We confided to
each other our personal challenges with our health as we were growing
older. When we were little girls at Harmony Hill we could never have
imagined the many joys and sorrows that life would allow us to share
together.
Nor could we have ever imagined the events that
would occur on February 22, 2003. On the day before, Jan had left
a message on my phone. “Just checking in, we need to get together, I
love you.” Before I could find time to return that call, the next
call came. The one that would change everything for Jan.
She had suddenly stopped breathing, the ambulance was taking her to the
hospital, we don’t know if she’s dead or alive.
Over the next few weeks we made the trip several
times a week to the hospital. There she was on life support, the
machines breathing for her and feeding her and keeping her alive.
We sat by her bed and talked to her and sang to her and reminisced and
prayed. In time, when she began showing tiny signs of response we
felt hopeful. Slowly, over a period of months her smile gradually
came back, she talked to us, called us by name, sang the old songs we’d
sung across the years.
But our hope for a full recovery dimmed as time
went by. She seemed to reach a plateau and then ever so
gradually, began to decline. Now, my best friend doesn’t always
know me when I go to visit her. She frequently has to be reminded
who her husband of 31 years is. Her own children have to tell her
who they are and even then it doesn’t seem to register with
her.
Jan’s life has changed. In reality, as Ray
and her children would say, we lost her on February 22, 2003. The
shell remains, but the loving, caring, talented, bubbly person has left
us. From this point on, she will have to be cared for as a
child. Someone will have to feed her, bathe her, toilet her, and
help her walk. She will need to be protected from things that
agitate her and cause her distress. The people she
recognizes readily and seems to have any recall of are from her early
childhood days. Sadly for me, personally, and for Ray and the
children, we are not a part of those memories. We came along
later in her life.
None of us, when we stand at the marriage altar
and recite the vows “for better or for worse, in sickness and in
health” know what that is going to mean across the years. But Ray
is demonstrating on a daily basis that he took those vows
seriously. We have watched as he has so faithfully stood by the
love of his life. Every evening he goes to the nursing home. He
says, “I’m going to see my sweetheart.” He reminds her who he is when
she calls him Daddy or looks at him like she’s never seen him
before. He brings her a snack – she loves McDonald’s
McFlurrys. He feeds her, sometimes he has to change her, or clean
her. He talks to her about the days activities. Then he
tucks her into bed and pulls up the side rails so she won’t fall out,
and turns off her light when she falls asleep. Then he goes home
to a house that’s empty and a life that has been forever changed and a
loving commitment to care for her to the best of his ability until
death causes them to part.
For some reason, God, in His providence, has
chosen to leave my best friend here on this earth. I don’t know
the reasons why. But I do know what my friend would do for me if
the roles were reversed. She would love my family for me, she
would come visit when she could, she would give support in any way
possible, and she would try to find a way to make my family’s burden
lighter. And that’s what I want to do for her.
That’s what this website is all
about.