A Time for Thanksgiving

Lately I've been thinking a lot about my grandparents on both sides of my family. I don't know why, but it's just come up. Not a sad remembering, but thinking back on all the great memories I have with them and the kind of people they are/were and how much I want to be like them. I am so thankful for the example they taught me and the role models they are/were in their everyday actions. I love them so much and I know with all my heart that they truly love me too!

Grandma and Grandpa Barnes on their wedding day


Honeymoon photo

Grandma and Grandpa Barnes for their 50th anniversary


I didn't get a whole lot of time with my grandpa Barnes, because he passed away when I was in seventh grade, but he was a wonderful, hard-working man. My Barnes grandparents are quite a bit older than my other grandparents because my dad is younger than his sisters, but I remember them well because they were in Maryville. My grandpa was a strong, stubborn man who believed you worked for what you had. He was a good ole farm boy, born and raised in Northwest Missouri. He was also the silent type, I think that's where I get some of my quiet nature, but he was smart and could fix or figure out what to do about seemingly anything, and he passed that on to my dad. In his last few months his Parkinson's disease started to worsen and he was falling at home and my grandma couldn't get him up herself. Also, he was beginning to develop Alzheimer's disease, so we had to put him in the nursing home. I know that was hard on him, but from what I can remember, he dealt with it surprisingly well, except for trying to pull some hyjinks at the home! He would try and break out frequently and would play tricks on the staff...which he kinda got in trouble for, but I'm glad that he was happy at the time.

I still remember everything about the evening I found out he had passed away. He had only been in the nursing home for a few months, and it was December 15, the night of our church's Christmas program for the kids and I was in charge of a station where they could make snowflakes out of beads and then we were going to give them to nursing home residents. I was excited to make one for my grandpa and give it to him. My mom was there too helping out with something. All of a sudden I see the director of my grandpa's nursing home come in (she went to our church too) and she started talking to my mom in the middle of the fellowship hall. Next think I know, Mom comes over to my table and tells me that we're leaving. She didn't say why, just said that we were all leaving. We start walking out into the parking lot and we see our student assistant (my mom and him always gave each other a hard time) and he started joking with mom, but she told him to stop and whispered to him what was going on. Then they hugged and we continued on to the car. I kept asking her what was going on, and she told me that Grandpa had died and that we were going over to help Grandma with things. We got there and Mom had to tell Grandma, which I'm sure was very hard for her, and we started calling other family members including my dad who was in Jeff City. Then, we went to see Grandpa at the nursing home. He was so pale and looked like he was just sleeping in his bed. He looked so peaceful, but I was still so sad for losing him. His was only the second family member's funeral I had attended.

I remember a bunch of good things about my grandpa. He was the best tickler and he could always make me laugh by chasing me around the house, but he would always catch me and give me a "tickle attack". He was the designated potato-masher for our Sunday dinners and he would even let me help sometimes. He would go out with me to ride my tricycle or bike in their paved driveway. He would wander around with me outside or in their house to find "new" toys to play with. He was, like the rest of my family, a farmer through and through and would always come out to our house to help whenever we were haying, harvesting, or working cows. I loved to go out to the pasture with him and the rest of my family and count cows, help feed, and watch them try and catch the calves to tag them. He was a good man and I hope that I can be even a little bit as strong and resourceful as he was. I'm so thankful for the time I had with him.