Reflections on the Fourth of July Weekend

This past week spent in the Nation's Capital has been an important one to me for a variety of reasons. The first time that I visited Washington D.C. was in the summer of 1965 when I attended a national convention for an organization that I belonged to in high school. After the convention was over, I was able to stay an extra two weeks to visit with my cousins who lived there. I was able to see so much of Washington D.C. and the surrounding area during that time and I loved all of our country's history that takes place and took place in this area.

I was back in 1970 for a wedding of one of my cousins and haven't been back since. Every few years our cousins from back east have a family reunion. Most of the relatives that attend are from their mother's side of the family as they are mostly from the east coast. My Aunt Teresa attends all of them and has always had such a great time. This year we were able to go with her and get to visit with our cousins that we don't see as often.

Over the course of the past year that I have written my blog, I have talked so much about the importance of our family to Teresa and how she is truly the matriarch of our family. All of my cousins love her dearly and she always has an honored place at family weddings and visits. Most people who know Teresa love her as she always sees the good in people and looks for the positives instead of the negatives in situations. Her strong faith in God has carried her through many good and bad times over the past almost 87 years. I admire this faith that she has.

Well, Teresa was in her glory at the farm visiting with her sister-in-law, Mary, and her nieces and nephews as well as Mary's family. She was up early every morning to get back to the farm and stayed late each night. She never appeared tired of these long days because she was in her element with family. She told stories of our family and of their dad, Tom, growing up in Douglas. She told the story that is probably my favorite one. My mom was about two years younger than Tom, but those of you who knew my mom will know that she was the fiesty one. My Uncle Tom had the same type of personality as Teresa. He was a kind and gentle man. When he was about 10 and they were attending Loretto School in Douglas, there was a boys' side and a girls' side for playgrounds. It was that way when I attended. Well, one day word got over to the girls' side that some kid was beating up Tom Scott. When my mother heard this, she flew over to the boys' side and proceded to "take care" of the boy who was beating up her brother. When the parents came to school to complain about their son being beaten up, the nun brought my mother (who was always very little) to the office so that they could see who beat up their son. It turned out that the boy was upset because the Scotts were "getting another baby--my Uncle Bill" and he was an only child.

On Sunday, we took her to our cousin Barbie's house in Maryland where she spent the night with Barbie, Joe, and Laura. Monday Pat and our cousin Lisa picked her up and brought her to our other cousin Judy and Neil's home, also in Maryland. We had dinner with everyone and Teresa was animated and talking and laughing about so many things. She has counted how many nieces and nephews that she has with spouses included and I think it is around 174. She tells anyone who will listen about how proud she is of this. And I can tell you that those nieces and nephews love her dearly.

We had reservations to spend Monday night in Baltimore as our plane was taking off fairly early from Baltimore on Tuesday morning. As we were driving on the freeway to Baltimore, she was talking to Kerri, Cameron and I about how much it meant to her that "her kids" got to come to this reunion this year. She wasn't able to finish what she was saying as she was crying.

Just before we left on this trip, I took her to a cardiologist appointment for a follow up on tests that they had run on her. The cardiologist found a mass on her lung on the CT scan that was done. She said it could be nothing serious or something very serious. She also doesn't want to see her back until she sees a pulmonary specialist to determine what it is.

I know that this was hanging over her head during this trip, but she has the most incredible outlook about it. I know that it has worried me. Judy was able to get her primary care doctor to recommend a specialist and they called today with a cancellation so she has an appointment tomorrow.

I am hoping and praying that it is nothing serious as she means more to me than I can put into words. And I know that there are a whole lot of other people out there who feel the same way.

So no matter what happens tomorrow, this past week has been a special one for us and something that I will always cherish.

Even though I already put this picture of her on a post, I am doing it again as this truly captures her smiling face for all of us!

I am going to try to be like Teresa and see the best in things and try to have her wonderful attitude about life. One could only hope to be half as good a person as Teresa Scott is!! In this day and age when so many people call themselves Christians, yet they are unaccepting and so intolerant of anyone or anything that is different from what they believe, Teresa truly exemplifies what a true Christian should be!