A Year of Blogging: October 28, 2011

October 28 was 'Plush Animal Lover's Day'. Yes, that's right. It's a day to love your stuffed animals. In my house, the stuffed animals are mostly bears, with the occasional Snoopy scattered around. Yet, even though I have a room and closet full of bears; growing up, I was not the person who had the most stuffed animals. That title belonged to my sister. Her entire bed was covered in stuffed animals. She also had a toy hammock hanging over her bed that was filled with animals. Mom used to joke that it took my sister half an hour to get all the animals off her bed so she could go to sleep. Don't worry, I had my fair share too, but Laura had so many more. If you're looking for something more monumental to celebrate today, lets turn to a couple of American landmarks. The Statue of Liberty was dedicated on October 28, 1886. On this date in 1965, workers finished the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. You can actually go up in both of these (although they did say on the news last night that the Statue of Liberty is closed for repairs). I have not been in either of them. My sister was up in the arm of the Statue of Liberty when a lightning storm struck! Not the place I would want to be. For the past 23 years, October 28 has had a sad note for me. When I was in 7th grade, a friend died in a house fire on October 28. It was the first time I'd had to deal with death. I know that experience changed me. My Mom took off work and took me to the funeral. She took several of my friends too. Some parents felt it wasn't appropriate to go to the funeral. My mom felt I would have to face death sooner or later, and it was better that my first funeral was that of a friend than that of one of my grandparents. But she also felt I shouldn't go alone, so she went with me. Afterwards, she invited my friends and classmates back to our house. She didn't want anyone to be alone. She knew that it was a tremendous loss to absorb at twelve years old. Jolene was buried in the same cemetery that my Grandma Wager's parents are buried in. Mom always nodded in understanding when we went to the cemetery each year to decorate her grandparents' graves, and I wandered to the opposite side of the cemetery. She waited patiently by the car until I came back. We didn't talk about it. But I do know after Jolene died, Mom made that cemetery our last stop on our tour of cemeteries each spring, and then we went home. Sometimes, I can still hear Jolene's laugh.