Joan

My neighbor often invites her grown children over to her place.  She sets up the lawn chairs in a circle around her fire pit under a canopy of tall cedar trees overlooking the valley below, and that’s where they sit and chat, rain or shine.  It’s a scene I’ve driven by many times over the years, and such was the scene on Sunday night as we drove down our driveway after being gone for the weekend.

That family sits around that fire pit for hours on end, usually with food and beverages nearby, enjoying the conversation and just being together.  We’ve been invited to join their “fire circle” on a few occasions and I’ve always felt honored to be included in this special family time of theirs.  But now, it will be no more. 

Our dear, sweet neighbor, Joan Gebhardt, died peacefully at home on Saturday night, with her family by her side.  Her boys and their significant others gathered together on Sunday to have a final farewell around the fire – their mother’s chair sitting empty in the circle - except for a bouquet of flowers brought over by our other dear neighbor, Priscilla Torseth.  Our little neighborhood will never be the same.

It’s not just sad to lose a woman we love, but it’s sad to lose traditions.  Joan’s children will miss many family traditions they’ve kept over the years, but we have a few we’ll miss, too. 

For years, Joan came over in the fall and winter on Saturday nights to have a bowl of soup with us and to play cribbage.  She and Kaleb would team up against Kory and I.  She was a pro, and even though she taught us well, it was rare we could beat her.  I’ll never be able to play that game again without hearing her voice in my head, as she laid down her cards saying, “15 two, 15 four, and the rest don’t score.”

So many traditions die when a loved one leaves us. It’s hard sometimes, to adjust to the new normal.  We had Thanksgiving traditions for years, always inviting up the same two families from Seattle to spend the day with us.  One of the families stayed the night and we’d go hiking together the next day.  Forget Black Friday, we had pumpkin pie to work off.  Then the mom got cancer and died.  The dad remarried and his new wife came with her own set of traditions and it didn’t include coming to our house.  It was a tough adjustment, especially for our son who likes traditions that don’t get altered.  But life is all about adapting to our changing circumstances, so we found another family to invite over who for years had been spending Thanksgiving alone.  It was good to have a full house again this year.

Our neighbor, Joan, also had a long standing tradition of setting up a Christmas tree on her porch and whoever came by for a visit during the holiday season got to take home an ornament off her tree.  I love the sentiment behind it because the only theme our tree has, is that of memories - ornaments bought on trips, Kaleb’s handmade ones, and ones we’ve gotten from visits to Joan’s.

While our traditions may have to change as the years go by, at least our memories of them are steadfast and can last as lifetime.  We’ll miss you, Joan.