Till We Meet Again...

Adene Ruth Houtz 1929-2008

Sunday night, while Scott was gone fishing, Scott's Grandma died in her sleep. She was only 79. The thing I remember most about Grandma Houtz is how she used simple traditions to show her love and unite her family. Every Sunday she made a special dessert and her children and grandchildren came to visit. Holidays were her specialty. Every holiday had a rhythm that never skipped a beat.

If Scott and I showed up to visit unannounced, both Grandma and Grandpa dropped everything they were doing and sat in the living room and listened patiently to all the new things in our lives. Selflessly, they rarely shared the details of their aging aches and pains unless we pulled it out of them.

Grandma always made me feel like I was one of her very own grandchildren, and I was. She knew about me. She went to every special event I invited her to. Her presence was enough of a present but she gave those, too. The day I knew she was my Grandma, just the same as Scott's, was my first Christmas Eve as Scott's wife. We gathered with the whole Houtz family to celebrate. I looked up on the mantle and saw a stocking with my name on it. I can't tell you how much that meant to me. They could have just given one stocking for each married couple but I had a stocking all my own. In a way, I felt like that stocking was always there with my name printed on it, waiting for my arrival into the family.

I know I will feel a great whole in the family with Grandma gone. God be with you, Grandma, till we meet again.