Sisters.

  First of all I want to thank everyone for reading, liking, loving and commenting on my memories of Mona…It is hard being 600 miles away, so this is my way of sharing my thoughts and love with Mona’s family and friends…Remember that these are “my memories” and might not be how someone else remembers it, but that is okay…

The more memories the After Mona and Jerry were married, we only saw each other at a funeral, wedding, or maybe a family reunion…Herb and I left the McCall area and moved to Utah…Mona and Jerry moved to Washington…They moved to California, we moved to Oregon…Finally our kids were all grown and had flown the nest…They had settled in Utah and we made Oregon our permanent home…

Mona and Jerry were doing some traveling and called one day with an invite to join them in Cancun for a weeks vacation…They were great tour guides…That gave us the traveling bug and two years later found us back in Cancun with them and our kids joined us as well…We invited them to join us in Arizona, where “we” made the arrangements to see a musical and take in some baseball games at spring training…When we were not out seeing the sights, we could be found in the pool or sun bathing or playing cards…We visited each other homes, in Utah we spent time at their Park City condo, connected with other relatives and friends…When they came to Joseph, we gave them a quiet place to relax and unwind from their busy schedule, with an excursion on our local train and the gondola at Wallowa Lake…An Alaskan Cruise was our last trip together…We decided that Barton Heights (our home in Joseph, OR.) was the best place to be and Mona and Jerry would come here to sit in the peace and quiet, play cards and if it was September, Mona and I made an apple pie every day, (apples from our tree)…Food was often at the center of our visits and the canned peaches they brought from their trees, lined our cellar shelves.

We were down to seeing each other once a year…They came here for the peace and quiet and we didn’t have to fight the traffic at their house…Mona and Jerry counted on my blog to keep in touch…If I wanted to hear their voices, I would just miss a few days of writing and Mona would be on the phone calling, “Della, are you sick?” “No, Mona, not sick, just taking a break.”…Then we would visit on the phone.

Mona called in July of 2019, “Della, can we come to Joseph, over the 24th, Jerry and I need a break, he is tired and I’m getting confused a lot.?” “Of course,” was my reply...My thoughts immediately went to dementia, no please no…Then I busied myself with menus for their visit…I had a bag of frozen apples, enough for one pie and they were easy to cook for so, we could mostly visit and rest…As Jerry hugged me that day, his eyes filled with tears and he said, “She is not doing very good, I had to bring her, it might be the last time, you two need some time together.”

We had a bitter/sweet visit, our niece Sue, came for an afternoon and we visited, reminisced, laughed a lot…The weather was good, cooler than Salt Lake City, which was good and we spent every day on the deck…Mona and I talked about our childhood, our parents, life on the farm and how much we were loved…Also we talked about the trips we took together and thankful we had those days…It was a hard goodbye, neither of us wanted it to end...Sending Love to the Park Family.