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Part XII
MY LIFE STORY
Karen’s Final Years
(2000 - 2003)
Around part of the world in 30 days -
The sale of our Houston townhouse as well as the
furnishing which we no longer needed or wanted went smoothly.
Moving our personal “stuff” to Kim and Dave’s in
Southlake was easy.
I purchased my Quanex company car and Karen still had her
convertible, so a few trips to Southlake with our personal stuff
enabled us to make that move relatively easy.
Cindie and Brian wanted several pieces of the furniture
from the Houston townhouse, including a hand painted “cupboard”
that Karen had fallen in love with and purchased as
well as my office furniture.
We shipped those pieces to them.
Concurrently, we completed preparations for our South
American tour.
The South American trip was with a company called TSA
based in Seattle, which chartered a British Air Boeing 757
aircraft and crew to pick up our group of some ninety tourists,
three lecturers and five guides in Miami, FL.
The plane was configured as first class all the way – two
luxury seats on each side of the isle.
We were alerted to the trip by a fellow Ashland Oil
executive and his wife who had taken similar trips with TSA and
who were booked this trip as well.
Our first stop was in Guatemala to see the Mayan Ruins.
The Mayans were one of
the greatest early civilizations, and their technology astounds
todays visitors to their villages. We flew into Belize and
focused our visit on the Mayan city, Tikal.
Tikal was one of the most
important Mayan cities since it was the economic, political and
military center of this pre-Columbian civilization.
We also spent time visiting El Mirador which is
frequently referred to as the “lost city of the Maya” because
this former Mayan capital is now overrun by jungle. At one time
it was the largest city (estimates are from 100,000 to 250,000
people) in Mayan civilization.
This entire culture disappeared around 850 to 1000 AD.
Scientists theorize that this this highly populated
region’s culture disappeared at least in part by severe droughts
– which seems incongruous as the area is now intense jungle.
We spent two nights and three days there learning about the
highly advanced (for that time) Mayan culture and people. The
ruins were a testament to the Mayan’s culture.
Their building skills mirrored the accomplishments of the
Egyptians in building the pyramids.
They had developed an unbelievably accurate method of
keeping track of the years.
Their culture was nearly extinct and the ruins had been
almost totally overgrown by the jungle.
To encourage tourism and the study of this culture,
Guatemalan authorities have cleared away the encroaching jungle
and improved access for tourists to these ruins.
From Guatemala we flew to Manaus, Brazil located on the Amazon
River near where the Negro River joins the Amazon River.
These two rivers are mammoth is size independently as
both – as well as a number of smaller tributaries to each – are
fed with the run off from the eastern slope of the Andes
Mountains on the eastern border of Peru, Columbia, Bolivia,
Venezuela and the western portion of Brazil.
We spent very little time in Manaus itself just a quick
driving tour. We
were taken to a river boat which comfortably accommodated our
group. This boat
took us five hours up stream to a reasonably sized resort which
was built entirely in the giant trees.
We had suspended walkways from the central buildings –
restaurants, bars, administrative offices and the preverbal
tourist shops to the sleeping rooms.
We spent two nights and three days at this resort,
including the boat ride to and from Manaus.
The amazing statistic that I remember about the Amazon
River is that the normal river level in the spring with the snow
melt from the eastern side of the Andes Mountains is some 30
feet higher than in the low water time of the fall.
With the width of the river, you get an idea as to how
much water flows in the Amazon River – and this was prior to the
joining of the Negro and Amazon Rivers!
We took several small boat tours to individual family
homes located on the banks of the rivers where the indigenous
people were totally self-sufficient by hunting, fishing and
gathering food, using local materials to build shelters and
doing whatever needed to be done to exist.
These settlers found building sites high enough that the
river did not flood them out in the spring.
We visited
with one family and learned of their life struggle to survive in
this jungle.
A Great Way To View The Expanse Of The Amazon River
After returning to Manaus and reboarding
our jet we flew to Iguazu Falls
which are waterfalls of the Iguazu River on the border of
Argentine and Brazil, just south of these country’s borders with
Paraguay. These
waterfalls make up the largest waterfall in the world.
It is much taller than
Niagara Falls and is twice as wide. In the rainy season, there
can be 450,000 cubic feet of water cascading over the falls per
second. It never fails to impress. We
visited the falls from the Argentinian side of the Falls
by walking on platforms
and walkways which enable you to get very close to some of the
falls. We also did a
river cruise during which we donned raingear and were taken
very near some of the falls.
We also took a small aircraft sight-seeing tour of the
area. It was an
unbelievable experience.
The expanse of the falls and the rivers feeding them was
immense.
Iguazu Falls The Iguazu
Falls has its own microclimate. No
other waterfall system in the world can compete with the beauty
of the Iguazu Falls, including the waterfall system and the
ecosystem that surrounds it. The landscape around it is home to
over 2,000 species of plants. Amongst them you’ll find exotic
orchids and towering trees. Plants blanket the ground. It is
quite adventurous walking through the rainforest. Seeing the
falls with the semi-permanent rainbows is incredible. No other
waterfall system in the world can compete with the beauty of the
Iguazu Falls, its included waterfall system and the ecosystem
that surrounds it. We spent two nights and two days at Iguazu
Falls and then
boarded our jet for The Falkland Islands.
The flight was some 2000 miles.
Landing in the Falkland Islands was an experience, as the only
airport is a British Military Base.
The Falkland Islands are
a “self-governing
British Overseas Territory”.
Under the 2009 Constitution, the islands have full internal
self-government; the UK is responsible for foreign affairs,
retaining the power "to protect UK interests and to ensure the
overall good governance of the territory”.
Our pilots of course needed permission to land at this
military base. The
Brits sent two of
their fighter planes up to escort our plane into British
territory and to accompany our landing there.
The pilots of the two fighters, had hand painted signs
displayed by the pilots alerting us to the fact that there was a
“party at the officers club that night’.
The Falkland
Islands (Islas Malvinas) are a remote South Atlantic archipelago
located 300 miles from the nearest point of Argentina.
With rugged terrain and cliff-lined coasts, its hundreds
of islands and islets are home to sheep farms and abundant
birdlife. The British reasserted rule of the Falkland Islands in
1833. The Argentina
government when it joined the United Nations in 1945, asserted
it’s rule over the Falkland Islands.
The UN, Britain and Argentina at various times attempted
to resolve the dispute but it was never resolved.
In 1982 Argentina was under the rule of a military junta
which was unpopular.
The junta, thinking that diverting attention to the Falkland
Islands by forcibly taking the islands would be beneficial. They
under-estimated the British, thinking it would not fight to
retain its control of the Falkland Islands.
The junta launched a
campaign to conquer
the islands. The
military was wrong and the British, in ten days, forced the
Argentinian military to retreat.
The capital of
the Falkland Islands, Stanley, sits on East Falkland, the
largest island. The town's Falkland Islands Museum has themed
galleries devoted to maritime exploration, natural history, the
1982 Falklands War and other subjects.
The Falklands are
surrounded by a rich fishing territory and more recently
petroleum has been discovered in the ocean surrounding the
islands. The
accommodations for visitors in the islands is limited such that
while our tour group found bed and breakfast accommodations for
all of the tour group and the guides, they could not find
accommodations our pilots and/or the plane- which I don’t
believe. The pilots took our plane to Chile for the three days
we were in the Falkland Islands.
There are as
many as a
million penguins nesting in the Falklands every summer,
representing five of the world's seventeen species – the King,
Gentoo, Rockhopper, Magellanic and Macaroni. What's more, for
the Gentoo, the Falklands are home to the largest population on
Earth. There are
some 100,000 pairs, approximately 5 per cent of the world’s
population of Magellanic Penguins nesting there.
The Falkland Islands is a fantastic place to observe
these magnificent birds.
We did not go whale watching or search for sea lions nor
seals, but they are all abundant around the Falkland islands.
We were scheduled to depart from the Falklands at about
noon for our next destination Porta Arenas, Chile where our
plane had spent the past two days.
However, the pilots learned of some needed maintenance
and were delayed
from their scheduled return.
The pilots then requested permission to fly over
Argentina in route to the Falklands, but when the Argentina
authorities learned that the plane was to be flown to The
Falklands, they denied over-flight permission, thereby requiring
the pilots to detour around Argentina making the flight an hour
longer. We arrived
at Porta Arenas about twelve hours late.
Porta Arenas, is a seaport city in
the southern most portion of Chile and South America.
Porta Arenas is the largest southernmost city in the
western hemisphere. During
the late 1800s,
Punta Arenas grew in size and importance due to the increasing
maritime traffic and trade travelling to the west coasts of
South and North America. This period of growth also resulted
from the waves of European immigrants, attracted
to the gold rush and sheep farming boom in
the 1880s and early 1900s. Patagonia is a very large sheep
farming area. The
city was a principle refueling stop for coal fired ocean going
ships because of its location.
The reason this stop was on our tour was to visit
Patagonia and Torres Del Paine National Park.
We spent a day touring the flat barren lands of Patagonia
and another day touring Torres del Paine. The
fantastically beautiful Torres del Paine National Park at the
southern tip of the Andes Mountain chain rivals the Rocky
Mountains in the U.S.
We had a bus tour through a small portion of the park and
stopped for a lunch at a small resort located on a natural
island in one of the park’s many lakes.
It was a wonderful full day excursion.
We returned to Porta Arenas for the night and off to The
Easter Island the next morning.
Torre del Paine National Park Scenes
The flight to the Easter Islands, which are located in the
southern Pacific Ocean some 2700 miles from Porta Arenas took
almost eight hours.
We landed at the only airport on the islands and were bussed to
our nearby hotel.
Geologically one of the youngest inhabited territories, Easter
Island was, for most of its history, one of the most isolated
cultures in the world. Its inhabitants believed to be Polynesian
and its history is not
well understood. The
major attraction to the island are the impressive number and
size of the Moais placed around the island.
It is known that most of these statues were carved from
the rock in a giant volcanic crater and somehow moved from there
to their places on the island.
There are still a number of unfinished Moais in the
crater. The carving
of the Moais from the volcanic stone is amazing.
More amazing is how these giant carvings weighing many
tons were then
separated from the rock in which they were carved. Even more
amazing is how these giant carvings were moved to their current
positions. Also,
somewhat amazing is the limited amount of weathering displayed
by the Moais which are totally exposed to the elements.
The Moais are then either individually or in groups
erected on impressive bases.
Most of these Moais are
standing several centuries after their erection.
We spent two days on Easter Island viewing many of the
Moais and touring the crater where most of them were carved.
From the Easter Islands we flew to Lima, Peru to refuel and then
to partially retrace our flight path to the Galapagos Islands.
The plane was not permitted to land on the Galapagos Islands
originating from The Easter Islands.
And refueling on the Galapagos Islands was very
expensive. It was a
long flight particularly with the stop for refueling.
The Galapagos Islands are part of Ecuador and are
positioned some 600 miles west of Ecuador.
We arrived at the Galapagos Island airport and were
bussed to a port where we embarked on small boats to make our
way to a cruise ship anchored off shore.
We would spend three nights on the ship and two days
visiting the Islands.
The cruise ship accommodations were upscale.
We traveled to and from the cruise ship to the Islands in
large pontoon life rafts.
Additionally, these boats were used for viewing sea life
near the shore. The
amount of sea life and birds on and around the islands was
immense. The variety
of flora and fauna of the islands is extensive.
The wildlife and the vegetation of the Galapagos Islands
have been extensively studied, beginning with Charles Darwin.
We spent most of our time on Santa Cruz Island,
the second largest island
in the Galapagos which is the hub for most of the tourist
activity in the area. The main town is Puerto Ayora. It is the
site of the Charles Darwin Research Station. The Research Centre
houses extensive tortoise enclosures.
The giant tortoise are an amazing sight.
The morning that we were scheduled to see the tortoise in
their natural habitat, it rained very heavily.
We were mainly confined to a shelter building and did not
see a single tortoise in the wild.
However, seeing them even in confinement at the research
center was rewarding.
We spent one morning swimming off a beautiful beach which
was near rocky formations which provided shelter for the hunted
wildlife from their predators.
The water was
teeming with playful Galapagos Island Penguins
which delighted playing with the swimmers.
We also took a side trip to Sierra Negra Volcano.
It has one of the largest volcanic calderas in the world
and one of the most active.
We also saw many of the Galapagos land iguana – the only
one that swims.
We departed the
Galapagos Islands
for Lima, Peru for
the crowning stop of the entire tour – Machu Picchu!
As the Machu Picchu portion of the tour was described to
us on this flight to Lima, we decided that Karen should not make
that portion of the trip, because of the 11,150 feet elevation
of Cusco, the jumping off
point of the Machu Picchu side trip, and her difficulty
breathing. TSA
arranged an alternate tour for Karen and I, plus one other of
our group who also was not comfortable
with the Machu Picchu’s elevation.
The Machu Picchu excursion was a two day trip, including
a two hour flight each way between Lima and Cusco.
The group overnighted in Cusco and then left by bus and
train for the village which served as the destination just
thirty minutes from Machu Picchu.
The group spent most of the day at Machu Picchu. The
three of us who had the alternate trip visited four large Inca
ruins not far from Lima during the two days.
Each of the ruins were large forts built by the Incas.
Each of them were massive, with living accommodations for
the families of the guards/fighters.
Our tours were not nearly as spectacular as the ones
enjoyed by the rest of the group who visited
Cusco, Machu Picchu and the Sacred Valley.
However, I did return to Machu Picchu some 14 years later
with my family in 2014.
We left Lima for Miami some 30 days after beginning the
trip. During the
flight back to Miami the pilots told us we had flown some 31,000
miles on the trip!
The cost was about $60,000 for both Karen and me.
We were in Miami only a short time, then boarded our
flight to DFW and back to Kim and Dave’s home.
It was a long and tiring trip, particularly for Karen.
However, it was certainly a trip to remember, as
it was the only way to visit that many widely separately
destinations in one month.
We settled in at Kim and Dave’s and prepared for
retirement.
That November,
George Bush, son of President George Herbert Walker Bush, and
recently the Governor of Texas, was elected president over Al
Gore the sitting Vice
President of the US
in an election that was decided by the narrowest of
margins, including a razor thin win in Florida.
Florida was the last state to be decided and the winner
of Florida would win the election. Florida was finally called by
the US Supreme Court, putting Florida in Bush’s column gave him
the necessary 270 electoral college votes.
Thanksgiving and Christmas 2000 were enjoyed
at Kim and Dave’s
new home in Southlake.
Cindie’s traveled to Southlake for a family Christmas.
The gathering was delightful.
The weather
was cold and Dave’s swimming pool was not heated.
Dave kept the water circulating in cold weather to keep
the pool equipment from freezing.
Consequently, the pool water temperature was probably in
the mid-forties.
Brett or Kyle had found a golf ball from an errant shot that
landed in their yard.
I threw the golf ball in the pool at the deepest place
and told the six grandsons that I would give whichever one of
them that retrieved the ball $5.
Brett was the only one that took me up on it.
To his credit he dove in, swam down to the about 8 feet
depth and retrieved the ball. He surfaced sputtering and
shivering and promptly jumped in to the hot tub.
He collected his $5.
Early in 2001 Karen and I decided to move back to our Lake
Harmony home. I was
very concerned that she had little to do, was too sedimentary as
well as drinking and smoking too much.
Kim was likewise concerned and we both suggested to Karen
that she should enter into treatment to stop her dependence on
alcohol. Karen would
not even talk about it, although she knew she was on a
destructive path. I
continued to explore opportunities for corporate board
positions, however, I had started this effort too late in my
career. I should
have pursued this as soon as I was hired into Quanex however, I
did not want to shortchange Quanex in any way by pursuing board
position(s) as I began my Quanex employment.
Board positions particularly with larger companies are
most often filled using “Good Old Boy Networks” and I did not
have that connection.
Consequently, when I began pursuing any such
opportunities in earnest it was too late.
I did however, pursue business consulting opportunities.
One such consulting
assignment was referred to me by David Carpenter, my old boss at
HI. His son had
formed an investment management company and was investing some
of his father’s considerable wealth in what they considered
promising start-ups, mainly in the Internet/technical fields.
One of these start-ups, was an idea promoted by a
commercial fisherman, originally from Argentina who had moved to
the UK. He was
confident that he could form a commercial fish marketing company
using the Internet to optimize the sales price received.
He convinced the
Carpenters that he had a winning idea and just needed start-up
funds. The
Carpenters invested in his company sufficiently to get the
company launched on a limited basis.
Unfortunately, the progress was slower than expected and
the Carpenters were uncertain as to whether to invest additional
funds requested by the entrepreneur .
David Carpenter asked me to consult with his son’s investment
company focusing specifically on evaluating this commercial fish
marketing venture.
After familiarizing myself with what the Carpenters could tell
me, I was off to the UK to spend time with the leadership of
this new venture. As
you might expect the venture was launched with little market
research – just using the knowledge of the idea’s originator and
another friend or two
from the commercial fishing industry.
The more we analyzed the status of the venture the more
it became apparent that this business would need considerably
more capital to succeed than originally thought.
This was further complicated by the fact that one of the
primary customers of this service was an Argentinian commercial
fisherman friend who was short on capital to outfit his boats
for the upcoming fishing season.
The start-up venture ill-advisedly loaned a significant
amount of money to this friend secured by his “upcoming fish
catch” and if that did not work out, his fishing fleet.
It didn’t work out as the amount of money advanced by the
start-up venture to the fisherman turned out to be insufficient
to get the fleet to the fishing grounds in time to harvest any
fish. So, no catch and the venture was faced with foreclosing on
a small Argentinian fisherman’s fishing boats.
A UK company trying to foreclose on a small
Argentinian fisherman’s fleet in Argentina was not easy.
The venture did not get it’s loaned capital back.
No further investments were forthcoming.
This was an interesting consulting gig but no opportunity
for any continuing employment.
In
2001 our family returned to Glacier Lodge for our Davis Family
Summer Reunion, however prior to checking into Glacier Lodge we
joined our nephew Jason Davis in his wedding to Brenda Glennie
in Evergreen, CO. Glacier Lodge served as a wonderful venue for
our family reunions, however, it was becoming difficult to
schedule our desired week every other summer as the occupant for
a specific week the prior year had first dibs on that week the
following year and they were not required to accept or reject
that choice until January 1st of the year.
Hence scheduling
reunions every other year made it difficult to get the
week at Glacier that we wanted – as it typically was a week in
high demand by many summer guests.
In August, Dave’s JB
Robinson boss who was Executive Vice President of Cole National
a Cleveland suburb headquartered optical business contacted
Dave. One of Cole’s
major businesses was operating and managing some 500
optical stores
located in the Sears Department Stores throughout the
U.S.. Dave was
recruited from Zales
and joined Cole to manage the Sears optical businesses.
Dave and family relocated from Southlake to Hudson, Ohio
a close suburb to Cole’s headquarters.
The family, particularly Kyle and Brett,
were very disappointed to leave their friends and the
weather in Texas for northeast Ohio.
However, Kim’s family would then be only a five hour
drive from our Lake Harmony home, essentially the same as
Cindie’s family, but in the opposite direction.
The terrible morning 9/11/21 -
The morning of Tuesday, September 11, I was in my Lake Harmony
home office working on the Carpenter’s consulting assignment.
Karen was sitting on the sofa in the great room having
her morning coffee and watching the Today Show, when the first
plane hit the World Trade Center North Tower.
On that day, 19 militants associated with the Islamic
extremist group al Qaeda hijacked four commercial passenger
airplanes and carried out suicide attacks against the U.S.
Two of the planes were flown into the World Trade Center
twin towers in NYC.
A third plane crashed into the Pentagon in Arlington, VA.
The fourth
plane was flying toward Washington, DC with a destination
speculated to be either the White House or the Capital.
It was forced down into a field near Shanksville, PA by
the passengers who stormed the cockpit knowing that were going
to die one way or another.
The passengers no doubt saved many lives and possibly a
critical Federal Government facility.
These attacks triggered a major U.S. campaign to combat
and defeat terrorism. This campaign was a major focus of
President George W. Bush in his two terms.
For the rest of that fateful day and for many days thereafter
our attention was glued to the tv reporting on the horrific
event. Fortunately,
Karen and I did not know anyone who was killed in this attack.
The final counting later concluded that 2997 victims were killed
or died of their injuries from that day.
For the next weeks the attack on the World Trade Center
was the primary news.
The war on terrorism has continued into 2022.
Kim and Dave were on a business trip to Europe just prior
to September 11th and were very fortunate to be able
to fly back into the country before nearly all of the
international flights were grounded until the authorities could
sort out the extent of the September 11th attacks.
Our family celebrated Christmas that year in our Lake Harmony
house. Cindie’s
drove down from Westford, MA and Kim’s from Hudson Ohio.
The six grandsons all piled into the bunk room and spent
the waking hours splashing in the swim-spa, outdoors enjoying
the snow or playing board games.
Karen and I had decorated the house with a large
Christmas Tree in the great room and in the recreation room,
Christmas lights hanging from the many outside eves on the house
and a large Christmas Wreath on the front door.
We had missed doing Christmas in Lake Harmony.
It was a wonderful family Christmas.
Karen and I celebrated a quiet New Year’s Eve watching the New
Your City celebrations on tv.
We stayed close to home that winter, enjoying occasional
dinners with Don and Pat Todd.
We traveled a couple of weekends each to Cindies and to
Kim’s however, Karen was less and less comfortable with the 6
hour drives to their
homes. I continued
working the Carpenter’s consulting assignment and looking for
other work opportunities.
Karen was declining cognitively and sleeping poorly.
Her doctor, a local MD was unsuccessful in convincing her
to enter into treatment for alcoholism, as were her daughters
and I. Her doctor
gave Karen a dire health warning but Karen was unwilling to
accept her advice.
Karen had little energy and was more and more sedimentary.
She would drive to the local strip mall to purchase
occasional groceries, cigarettes and vodka.
She had less and less interest in visiting with our
various Lake Harmony friends or even dining out. She did not
want to visit either Cindie or Kim’s as the drive was “too far”.
We were pretty much house bound.
Karen and I celebrated our 46th wedding
anniversary on June 9th with a nice steak dinner at
home.
On Thursday, June 20th, about 9 PM, I was working in
my office upstairs.
Karen was in the great room watching television and
engaging in her habitual evening pastime of drinking.
I heard her fall in the kitchen. I rushed to her.
She was on the kitchen floor sobbing and rubbing her left
hip. I asked her
what happened and she murmured that she did not know “how I
fell”. I picked her up
carefully and carried her to our nearby bed (her weight was only
about ninety pounds).
I tried to determine how badly she was injured, but she
could not describe her pain other than it was her left hip.
I quickly cleaned up the kitchen mess and then carried
her to the car. She
said she could sit up and rode in the passenger seat.
We drove the thirty minute drive to the Wilkes-Barre
Hospital emergency room.
After arriving at the emergency room, I located a wheel
chair, placed Karen in it and wheeled her into the hospital.
Fortunately, there were only two other persons in the
room looking for care.
Karen was seen
promptly. The
doctor asked me what had happened and I told him all that I
knew. (It was never
clear to me whether she fell and broke her hip or her hip broke
and she fell.)
Karen was little help, as her pain was increasingly intense.
The doctor examined her quickly and then dispatched her
for X-rays. The X-rays
were read promptly and the doctor advised me that she had a
broken hip . He recommended surgery asap, to which I agreed.
The surgery was performed early the following morning and it was
pronounced a success.
I visited briefly with Karen after she had recovered from
the surgery but she
was groggy and wanted to sleep.
I called both Cindie and Kim to tell them of Karen’s
situation. Karen was
alert later in the day as the medications seemed to have her
pain under control.
The doctors were satisfied
with Karen’s post-surgery progress and on Saturday morning
suggested that she be transferred to a nearby rehab center for
continued recovery and physical therapy.
She was transported to the rehab center some ten miles away by
ambulance. She
seemed sanguine with being in the rehab facility.
However, the rehab facility was not a full nursing
facility and it was clear to me that I would need to be with
Karen much of the time.
Additionally, Karen, was refusing to eat and was being
very difficult with
the nursing staff in the center.
On Sunday, the doctor in the rehab center who had
admitted her to the rehab facility, determined that Karen needed
more continual nursing care and returned her to the hospital for
additional treatment and care.
This latest move was taken after I had left that evening
and I was unaware of it until I returned to the rehab center
early the following morning.
I then went to the hospital to find Karen who was having
a bit of breakfast in her new room.
Cindie and her boys drove from their home on Monday to visit
Karen. Karen was not
very alert nor interested in visiting with them.
I left with Cindie and the boys after Karen had eaten a
small portion of her dinner and told us that she wanted to
sleep. Kim, Dave and
their boys drove to
Lake Harmony arriving early Monday
evening.
Cindie, Kim, Dave, their six sons and I visited a while.
Karen Swanson Davis dies –
Cindie and I planned to drive to the hospital first thing
Tuesday morning. Kim
and Dave plus their sons planned to come to the hospital later
that morning.
As Cindie and I were driving to the hospital that
morning, Dave had
taken a call on our home phone from someone at the hospital who
told him that Karen had died that morning.
He called Cindie to tell her and asked her to tell me, as
he knew that I was driving and Dave did not want the news to
disturb me to the point of having an accident.
Cindie and I continued to the hospital.
Karen was still in her room as the staff waited for the
family to see Karen one last time.
Cindie and I spent some time with Karen.
Kim decided not to go to
the hospital as she wanted to remember Karen as she was when Kim
and Karen were last together.
Karen’s death was listed as respiratory failure – her
fifty years of smoking got her.
Cindie and I dealt with the discharge from the hospital and
began working with the mortuary.
Karen and I had previously decided that we would be
cremated when the time came.
We kept Don
and Pat Todd informed as to Karen’s hospitalization.
One of them told Split Rock
Resort of Karen’s death and the resort employees
delivered a small mountain of food for our family.
Brian arranged his schedule and left work to join us in
Lake Harmony. Cindie,
Kim and I planned a memorial service to be held in Lake Harmony
for the following Saturday.
We advised my and Karen’s family that we would have a
memorial and burial service in Iowa in the fall which would give
our families more time to plan on attending.
The Lake Harmony memorial service was well attended by our Split
Rock Resort friends and neighbors. A copy of the memorial
service and Karen’s obituary follow:
Our six grandsons were the Honorary Bearers.
Grandson Kevin wrote a very nice eulogy which he
delivered at the Split Rock memorial.
On the weekend of October
12 and 13, our family
gathered in Iowa for Karen’s Iowa memorial service and burial,
which were held at the Hartland Friends Church and Hartland
Cemetery respectfully.
Nearly all of my siblings and family joined us as did
Karen’s sister-in-law, Lee and her daughter Lynn.
Several of our relatives on dad’s side of the family also
joined us. After the
memorial service the attendees walked the forty yards to the
next door cemetery and the Ware and Davis plots.
Karen and when the time comes, my headstone is next my
parents and near my mother’s family.
Brother Bob
had
coordinated
the purchase and
installation of the headstone.
Karen’s ashes were buried behind the stone.
Cindie’s idea was to have the headstone engraving include
a cat looking over us. Bob also hosted our immediate family at a
typical Iowa burger and ice cream dinner on Saturday evening.
Kim, Dave and their sons flew into Marshalltown on their
company’s private jet.
Between Karen’s memorial service in Lake Harmony and in Iowa, I
spent my time remembering Karen, distributing her clothes,
jewelry and other possessions to Cindie and Kim, their sons and
friends and neighbors who had use for them and visiting Cindie
and Kim’s at their homes.
Her clothing went to a local charity which was delighted
to receive such good and much of it only slightly used.
Cindie and Kim took the valuable pieces of jewelry.
Prior to Karen’s death, Cindie and her family had planned
a short vacation trip to Bermuda.
They invited me to go with them which was an invitation I
gladly accepted. It was my only visit to Bermuda and among other
things we swam with the dolphins in a pool.
I made at least three trips, mainly over weekends, to
each of Cindies and Kim’s in the six months following Karen’s
death. Our very good friend, Ben Shapiro invited me to lunch and
an afternoon with him just visiting the MA countryside, beaches
and other sites. It
was a wonderful afternoon and I really appreciated his reaching
out to me. I joined
Cindie’s family for Thanksgiving.
Our family gathered at my Lake Harmony home for Christmas.
Nancy and Neal travelled to PA to join us for our first
Christmas without Karen is some 46 years.
Nancy and Neal arrived at the Newark, NJ airport a few
days before the others.
Nancy wanted to go to NYC as she had never been there. I
picked them up at the airport and we drove into Manhattan
from Newark. The three of us spent two whirlwind days in the Big
Apple, staying at the theater district Marriott Hotel, visiting,
a number of the tourist sites, attending a Broadway play, eating
too much and doing some last minute shopping.
Late in the evening we stopped into a Marriott housed art
gallery. There was
an 18” by 18” statue of an eagle with wings some-what unfolded
for sale. I believe
the price was about $6000.
I have always liked eagles and had never owned a statue
of one. I offered
the owner $3000 providing he would ship it to Lake Harmony.
To my surprise he accepted the offer!
Did not even counter my offer.
Two days after returning from NYC, the eagle arrived at
our house in a wooden box which must have been 4’x4’x4’.
We unpackaged it and proudly displayed it in our great
room TV cabinet.
Cindies and Kim’s both arrived a few days before Christmas.
In addition, Brian’s widowed mother, Felicia came with
them. We had a very
active family Christmas with almost continuing roaring fires in
the fireplaces – I had too much time on my hands earlier in the
year, and when offered the opportunity to harvest wood from
several hardwood trees on a neighbor’s lot which was being
cleared for the construction of a house, I accepted.
I had some 8 to 10 cords of great firewood to burn.
We celebrated a wonderful Christmas dinner with the
fifteen of us plus we invited Don and Pat Todd to join us for
dinner. The adults
ate in the dining room and the six grandsons ate in the great
room-kitchen dining area.
Nancy and Neal were scheduled to fly home (Seattle, WA) from the
Newark airport on the red-eye flight on Christmas night.
About mid-afternoon very heavy snowfall began.
Brian and I drove Nancy and Neal to the Newark airport in
one of the heaviest snow falls that I have ever experienced.
Fortunately, we were on Interstates nearly all the way.
We dropped Nancy and Neal at the airport several hours
earlier than their flight, which fortunately was on time.
Brian drove back to Lake Harmony in the heavy snow.
Fortunately, the local roads we needed to use were also
reasonably plowed.
When we arrived at our house, Dave was out in our drive and
parking area with my
snow blower clearing the way to access our garage. We celebrated
New Year’s Eve at our home in Lake Harmony.
The girl’s and their families headed to their respective
homes the next day, fortunately the weather was good.
I resumed my efforts to find consulting work or other
engagements which would challenge me but was mostly
unsuccessful. I
planned a trip to Arizona, to visit my sister Bev and her
husband, in Scottsdale. I thought about possibly relocating to
Arizona as I had little interest in spending my winters in Lake
Harmony. However, I did
not want to be that far from Cindie’s in Boston and Kim’s in
Cleveland. It was a
dilemma.
On May 26, 2003 the Split Rock Cottage Owners Association (SRCOA)
initiated a Split Rock Community Memorial Garden, paid for by
the owner of the Resort.
A plaque containing the names of all residents who were
deceased since the SRCOA was formed was dedicated.
Karen’s name is on
that plaque.
Don and Pat Todd donated a bench named for Karen for visitors to
rest on which was placed near the memorial rock.
Cindie, Brian and the boys came to Split Rock for the
weekend and attended the very nice celebration with me and our
SRCOA friends and neighbors.
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