The storm surge

The calm eye of the storm passed as the final guest left the house.

It was so hard to leave Tallahassee. The funeral was only yesterday.

I loaded Evelyn and all the kids in the van and I went back into Howard and Shannon's house one more time. As I did the final sweep, I couldn't resist sitting at the beautiful piano. I played an old Dolly Parton / Whitney Houston song - "bittersweet... memories..." The words of the song were echoing in my mind... "I will always love you..." as I sat there under a portrait of Howard and his family.

I cried a few of tears thinking about my family. I thought about my grandmothers and other relatives who could welcome my baby Grace into heaven. They could tell her stories about her daddy when he was a little baby like her. Then they could tell her stories about "little boy Barry." That would be sweet.

Then I thought about Howard. Howard is there too. Howard left a wife, a little girl and a baby girl.

As I looked at Howard's portrait, I just wished with all of my heart that he could be there with my relatives to welcome baby Grace into heaven.

Something about him having a little girl to hold and my little girl having a daddy to hold her... something about that just really got to me. I sat at the piano and cried buckets and buckets of tears. After all our family had been through, I finally had my weeping and wailing moment there in the privacy of Howard's living room.

I hoped Howard would hug Grace and tell her that he was a friend of her daddy. I hoped he would sit her on his knee and tell her stories about her daddy coming over to the house and playing the guitar and leading Bible studies. "I sat in your Daddy's Sunday School class and we argued about what the Bible meant." Now Howard knows who (if either of us) was right. I will have to wait.

Howard could tell Grace all kinds of stories about her mommy too. They grew up together. He could tell Grace what a beautiful, kind, godly woman her mother was.

I hoped Howard would also tell Grace all the stories that he never got to tell his little girls.

I cried some more. Bucketfuls. More wailing and weeping. I don't know if it was for Howard or for Grace, but I loved them both.

As I close the door for the final time, Whitney and Dolly are in my head... I will always love you ooooo I uh I.... will always love you....