This morning Carolyn and I were saddened but not exactly surprised to get the news that my cousin Gordon Loveridge had died. His health hasn't been the best of late and I even heard someone (could have been Gordon himself) chuckle good-naturedly about his "weekly hospital admission". He wasn't staying in the hospital a long time but he was making up for the short stays by having frequent admissions.
Lately, I've had the pleasure of having Gordon ride along with me and even help me deliver Meals on Wheels. There's not much to think about while driving the route so I've found it really nice to have someone along to talk with. Like listening to "Books on Tape" it helps pass the time.
But the bonus for me is that Gordon, as my cousin, shared many of the same family stories I grew up with but from a very different point of view. Being 14 years older than me and even 9 years older than my oldest brother, he saw our parents when they were just starting out in life as a married couple. He saw my grandfather's extended family from the vantage point of the oldest grandchild while I saw it more from the middle of the pack.
Like me, Gordon recently retired and, like my wife, his wife has also chosen to continue working full time. Had we been really close for the last several years, we'd undoubtedly have spent even more time together. But I treasure getting to know him better, even if it came in small 3 hour segments every couple of weeks.
Gordon will be missed.
ReplyDeleteI can relate to your ride-along visits with Gordon. My cousin Bonnie and I have been meeting at the Marconi Light Rail Station M-Th since September, when she got a State job downtown. I haven't talked with her this much since her family moved in with us for a few months when we were kids. I treasure that daily 20-minute train ride!
I guess I should expect that as I get older more and more people that I knew reasonably well will be dying. I've just been amazed at how many have happened in this last year. That last of the previous generation of Loveridges and the first of this one. (Dad's not mine.) Barbara Andreason, Bob Jimenez, Dick Hart, Worth Bellamy. It just strikes me as a lot.
ReplyDeleteAustralian folk singer Judy Small said it well with her lyrics to "I thought I'd be much older when my friends began to die." When I passed the age at which my mother died, I realized just how young she was and how much more of life she deserved.
ReplyDeleteI probably didn't see the same as Lee is, however, because we moved to California. All the deaths and changes he sees I missed out on because I was 700 miles away.