Father's Day Eve with the family

The Grands waiting to eat wings!

Mike aka Bop

Wes

The whole family

Mike was scheduled to go to work Father's Day evening so we decided to meet up with our family on Saturday evening.  At first we were going to go to the Red Hawks game and then we thought of Frontier City.  It was soooooo HOT that we decided to go bowling.  The bowling alley on North Penn was our choice and then we remembered that Wing Stop was right there in the same location.  Mike and Wes, the father's we were honoring, love Wing Stop.  So it was decided we would meet at Wing stop and then go to Heritage Lanes and go bowling.

After stuffing ourselves with wings we made our way over to Heritage Lanes.  Mike paid for two games and we probably should have only bowled on game, but we had fun.  The grands had a blast.  JJ is really getting the hang of things.  He made a strike on the lane without the bumpers.  He was so proud of himself.  We were there until almost 9:00p.m.  We laughed at each other and our selves.  It was so good just to relax and have fun in the air conditioned bowling alley.  There were a few other families that had the same idea that we had, but I think we had more fun than the rest of them.  I will post the pictures and let them speak for themselves.

Home is where the Heart is, but part of our Heart was in that home.

Today I was all set to blog about the great Father's Day Eve we had yesterday, then while Mike, JJ, Amara and I were at church today and eating lunch afterward at China Moon in Chickasha our country home was burning down.  To say the least that has taken the wind out of my sails today.  It just did not feel right to blog about how wonderful yesterday was when all I wanted to do was cry today.  So I have decided to pour my heart out tonight.

JJ and Amara are asleep and Mike is at work.  I told Mike I know that people are going to think we are crazy or just plain self centered, but this has just been a devastating day.  I will back up... In 1985 Mike and I  were looking for a place to buy in Anadarko School District.  We wanted to live in the country.  We had been living the last 5 years on the farm I grew up on.  We decided to get out of the farming business and move our kids to a larger school.  We loved Oney and so did our children, but I had a pretty good idea that Oney was going to have to consolidate in the near future.  We looked at several different places, but then one day Sue told us about this place east of Washita on 72 acres of trees.  The first time we drove up to this older square house that sat about one quarter of a mile off the road in the trees, I knew I was in love.  It was only 7 miles from town and about 15 miles from my job teaching at Oney.  This was the perfect place to bring our 3 children, two horses, a dog and a cat.  We only brought the house cat with us.

The house was not red wood, but the wood was painted a deep red color.  It sat in the middle of the 72 acres up on a hill with a canyon down below.  When you looked out the huge picture window on the north side of the house it looked like a picture from a house in Colorado.  When it snowed in the winter it really gave you that feeling.  There was just one problem.  It was a 2 bedroom house and there were 5 of us.  The good news was our girls were young and could share a room.  Ryan was excited to make the basement his room.  He loved being down there.  So we turned a 2 bedroom house into a 3 bedroom and later when the girls found out they could not share a room....we turned the family room into another bedroom.  It was really sort of cool.

The inside of the house had real wood paneling that was sort of a knotty pine with a varnish on it.  I remember a close neighbor to our farm at Oney had that same paneling in their home.  I loved it.  We had a corner fireplace.  I had always wanted a fire place.  We bought a fireplace insert and it really heated our house.  The house worked just perfect for us.  It was not new, it was not really large, nor was it the most updated kitchen, but it was ours and we loved it.

The kids loved living in the trees.  We had a large yard with a big trampoline under big shade trees.  We had wild turkey's, deer and lots of quail.  Ryan had a hunting place in his own back yard.  We were close to the river and our neighbors put in a large pond and the boys fished in it.  Those boys were always up to something.  Our next neighbor had 2 boys very close in age to Ryan and they had one daughter very close in age to our two girls.  There was always excitement around our two houses.

We lived in this house in 1997 when Ryan was killed in a car accident.  He died in January of that year and then my mother died in May of the same year.  There were several reasons why we moved to town to live in my mother's house after she died.  The girls were happier in town and the truth is Mike and I kind of like the convenience of living in town too.The one thing though, we were not willing to give up our house and the 72 acres in the country. We really intended to re-model the house and move back out there.  There are several reasons why that never happened, but when people wanted to buy the place Mike would price it so high that no one would ever really buy it.  The truth is we could never sell the place that had so many memories of all of our children.  Because Ryan was gone, it was sort of like a part of him was still there.  When we went out there it was like you could feel his presence there too.

That brings me to what happened today.  How do you explain to people who have never lost a child how painful it is.  It has been 14 years since we lost our only son.  A person asked me one day, "Do you think about Ryan very often?"  I just said do you think about your son very often.  The child was only about 6..I got a very strange look from that person.  If you were wondering the same thing, yes people who had a child who has gone on to be with Jesus...think of that child every minute of every day of every year.  The pain does not go away.  The hole that is left in your heart and family is there forever.  It does not get easier and you Do Not get over it as some people think you should.  Yes, you find a way to go on and you don't walk around in tears all the time, but there are times when you do cry.  Well, today I must tell you that I have cried all day.  I did not live in that house any more, but the memories of my children growing up lived in that house.  Ryan, Krista and Amanda's spirits were in that house, along with the many Things I left out there.  Do I need those things, can I live without them, of course I can.  I live each day without my son, but I don't have to like it or get over it.  It is a part of who I am.

I certainly hope that no one ever has to experience that sense of loss.  I am talking about the sense of loss of losing a child or in losing the home you raised your children in to  a fire.  I still go out and drive by the house I grew up in every once in awhile just to remember my childhood.  I can see my dad driving that little Massey Ferguson tractor up the road and riding back to the house with him.  I don't know how it will feel each time to go to our little farm out by the Washita River from now on.  I just don't know, but I think it will hurt and I will cry just a little each time.  The trees and the house are gone.  I know that trees can grow back, but I'm not sure that those old trees can grow back in my lifetime.  Much of that land was native and had never seen a plow on it ever.  Right now my heart is heavy and it feels much like it did when Ryan died.  It is sort of like losing him all over again.  It has brought back many hurtful memories.  It has reminded me how much I miss my son.  I'm sorry but that house was not empty at all, there were things in it but more importantly there was a little bit of each person in our family there.  Like I said before we will go on, but just a little piece of our hearts was torn away today when the fire came up that driveway and took our house that we called home.

P.S.  Maybe tormorrow I can write about our Father's Day Eve.

Jack Deason my Father

This weekend is Father's Day.  My husband says it's a made up holiday, but I still think it is a good one.  I thought I would use this time to honor My Father.  I've already used this venue to talk about what a great Grandfather my husband is.

Jack Deason as a baby

My dad, Jack Deason, was born Gilbert Jack Deason to Essie Morgan Deason and Oscar Haywood Deason on October 1, 1923.  He was born in a little house on the side of a canyon in the middle of Caddo County, Oklahoma.  His birth certificate says Gracemont, Oklahoma.  In fact it is about 5 miles west of Gracemont.  He was the oldest of three children.  He had two sisters.  Reba June, and Polly Jane.  My grandparents called their children Jack, June and Polly.  No one knows why they called Polly by her first name and not Jane.

Jack with his parents Oscar and Essie

Jack with his family  Essie, Oscar, Polly and June

Dad started to school when he was 5years old.  I never had to listen to stories about how far he walked to school, because the one room school he attended was in fact on the property his parents owned.  He had to walk down the hill about 1/4 of a mile.  I guess he was a very smart little boy and even though he was young, he picked up on everything the teacher was teaching the 1st graders and the 2nd graders so she promoted him to 2nd grade that first year.  Yes, my dad skipped 1st grade.  I don't think that was really unusual back then, except that he didn't turn six until October.  He went to school at Foster through the 8th grade.  At that time Foster students went to Fort Cobb to high school.  Later when I was growing up it became part of the Oney School District which is now Binger-Oney School.  Back to Dad,  he first met my mom when they both went to Fort Cobb to school in 8th Grade.

Jack's Senior Picture

I don't know too much about how they met or when they started dating.  I guess I need to ask my Aunt Polly.  She was 11 years younger than my dad.  All I do know is that my parents met in high school and graduated in 1940 from Fort Cobb High School.  Dad was only 16 years old when he graduated.  Mom was only 17 at the time, but she turned 18 before he turned 17.

Dad went with his friend Eunice Morrison on a trip after graduation.  I am not sure where all they went but I know they drove up Pike's Peak in Colorado.  Those two guys talked about that trip for years.  They went other places I'm just not sure where all it was.

Maye and Jack about 1945

Dad also attended OSU and my mom went to Cameron in Lawton.  My parents married I think after one year of college.  They were married on August 16, 1942.  I know that they were married when my dad was in school at Stillwater.  They moved back to the farm after that year so my dad could help out there.  I'm not sure what year he went in to the Navy, but he was drafted in the Navy during WWII.  Mervin was born May 9, 1944.  Dad was one of the last people drafted and therefore when the war ended he was one of the last ones to be let out.  He was trained on a submarine.  The war ended before he was sent overseas.  When he got out of the Navy he wanted finish his degree at OSU, but they could not find a place to live.

Jack the Sailor

After the war he was asked to teach Vetrans classes.  He taught classes to men coming back from the war.  He taught in two different places in Oklahoma...Greenfield and Binger.  Then he came back to the farm to help my grandpa.  David was born  July 7, 1948.  Maye and Jack, my parents, bought the west half of the section where my grandparents lived.  I don't know what year they bought the land.

Six years later I came along.  February 28, 1954. I have so many fond memories of my dad.  Almost every day that my dad went to the field on the tractor I knew when he would come in for lunch and the evening meal too.  I would run down the road south of our house about 1/2 mile and ride the tractor back to the house with him.  He always helped me with my show animals.  He also would not let me move pipe in the field or drive the tractor to work ground.  I only had to pick cotton or chop weeds if I wanted to earn extra money.  He wanted me at the house helping my mother.  We did go to the stockshows as a family.  It was almost like the Tulsa State Fair was our vacation every year.  That and the one day we took in the summer to go to an amusement park in Oklahoma City.  We ate all of our meals together at the table where my dad prayed before our meals.  We drove 20 miles to Anadarko three times a week to church.  Both our parents set a good example of studying the bible and teaching others about Christ.

Me and my dad

My parents lived on this farm all of our lives.  They farmed and raised Shorthorn cattle.  People came from all over the USA to buy cattle from my dad.  He was on the school board at Oney, an Elder at the Church of Christ at Anadarko, and was also on the National Shorthorn Cattle Association Board.  He was always involved in the community.  Dad and my Uncle Jim Rogers bought the J&J Ford in 1968.  My parents moved to town in 1973 because he had gotten sick.  Jack lived until December 22, 1975.  He was only 52 years old, but he had a great impact on this world in his short time.

He never got angry with me.  I can't speak for anyone else, but he never raised his voice to me and he also never spanked me.  He would just say "Sister, you didn't need to do that.  You can always tell us the truth."  That was enough to crush my heart and feel so bad for what I'd done.  He was a soft spoken man, and when he spoke most people listened.  Some way, I'm not sure how, my parents were able to make meWant to please them.  I just never wanted to disappoint them.

Dad with Brian and Kenny

Dad with Amy, Kendra and Kerri

Dad, Ryan and me

If he were here today I would just say Thank You for being such a great dad.  Happy Father's Day!

One of the last pictures of  Dad.