Family Man

9 years today. You'd think I have run out of things to say.

Apparently not.

May 24, 2002. 

Jim died as he lived….a family man.

The final 7 years of his life were spent making memories…particularly with our young grand daughter after his first 2 heart attacks. He said he wanted her to always remember she was loved. She has.

His last week was spent making roadworthy a pop-up camper that spent a number of years living abandoned in a field that someone had given my daughter and her then fiancé. The plan was a family camping trip Memorial Day weekend to end his week of vacation before returning to work.

His final moments were spent thinking of others, killing the snake that in the end killed him so that the children who played in our yard would not be endangered by it. At that point he did not know the snake that slithered from beneath the axle and across his hand had, in truth, bitten him and assumed the nitroglycerin would do it’s magic and he’d soon feel better.

The last seconds of his life he looked into his son’s eyes and heard the final words to pass his ears…”I love you, Dad.”

In the space between heartbeats…he was gone.

He was my husband, lover and best friend; father to our children and Papa to his beloved grand. My life changed the day he walked into it and changed again when he left it.

33 years from day one to day last…a lifetime of memories.  9 years…another lifetime without him. I will always love him and I will always miss him.

From Craig Campbell "Family Man" Lyrics

“They're a world my world revolves around
My sacred piece of solid ground
The flesh and bone that gives me strength to stand
They are a fire in my driving on
The drive behind my coming home
The living, breathing, reason that I am
A family man

What keeps me keeping the faith
What makes me believe I can
Family man

There's a fire in my driving on
The drive behind my coming home
The living, breathing, reason that I am
A family man.”

Today, I think and remember all that he was to all of us who were graced to have him in their lives and how his legacy lives on in the children we created together and the grand who was the light of his life. We were blessed and we are grateful.

To my Family Man…Jim Ingle – 12/3/1950 – 05/24/2002….you are loved and forever remembered. Your life does, after all, mean more than your death.

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