“The day of his father’s funeral, my dad was sitting on the side of his bed tying his shoes in preparation for the services. When he looked up, my grandfather was there in the doorway.
“I’m sorry I had to leave so quickly. I’ve just come to say goodbye,” was all he said before he was gone. Daddy was never embarrassed to share the story with anyone.”
* * *
The days between her father’s death and his funeral held other unique moments. Every time Whitney started up her Volkswagen, the family’s favorite radio station, WBYA out of Searsport (“Your Home on the Bay”) was playing her dad’s favorite song – “The Best is Yet to Come.”
I asked her how many times in those few days this had happened, and Whitney surprisingly estimated somewhere between fifteen and twenty!
* * *
…soon after John’s funeral, four-year-old Tessa got up one morning and went downstairs to casually report to her parents that she had spoken to Papa, as she called her grandfather.
“He has his legs back,” she informed them, “and he promised that whenever I’m in a plane, flying back and forth between Maine and Colorado, he’ll be with me.”