A Letter from Judy - April 29, 2017
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I saw you all at the 2007 reunion with my 4th husband Rodger Donahue. He had just been diagnosed with prostate cancer but insisted he was well enough to go. Also my sister Jan fay Thompson lives in Katonah so a visit with Bruce and Jan figured in. Rodger died  March 15th 0f 2015 of Alzheimer’s, heart disease and cancer. Seven years of 24/7 care giving have left me knowing that for me 57 years of  marriage, time served, is time served will be my all time best effort..

My brother in law Dave Lyons told me about the all class reunion of 2011 but Rodger’s health, well that is self explanatory to most of you. My sister Joanne Lyons died at 58 of pancreatic cancer. Dave has remarried the sister of a guy he knew at Corning and she is and always will be a gift to our family. Their blended family wears me out just keeping up. .

Bruce just retired from Building and Panning. Jan retired several years ago from Westchester County Hospital does some part time work. They garden on Todd Road in Katonah..

I get to stay in Birdseye Indiana pop 300 . Rodger’s biggest gift to me was Birdseye. He never lived here but on a trip across the county to meet each other’s families in 2003 he triple A AA’d a stop at the cemetery here where his parents are buried. As we crossed into the welcome to Birdseye rock I saw the two story white houses with green shutters, the big old red sway back barns and silver silos, the rolling Ohio Valley hills and thought good grief this is just like Sherman Ct.  where I was living at 13 when my Mother married Henry Vaughan of AT%T Long Lines in White Plains and I got sprung from a nunnery. Big sheltering fall on your house maples, a humongous lake, two lane winding roads 45 minutes from Louisville . I saw home.  Good bye California hello Birdseye we left 15 combined grandchildren  and bought my forever house a year later. .

I’m going out of here feet first, but not for another 25 or 30 years. I used to say I was going to live til 100 like my grandma nd great grandma but after 35 years of social work I realized that putting an end time was a self fulfilling prophecy. They died  after the got telegram from the President. I have no plans to get a Tweet from Trump but just know in my heart I’m going to live forever. I’m going to learn how to fly. Wink Wink..

Abby will be leased to know here blooming shrub is now the height of the front porch, I have 2 acres to roam a round on my riding mower with a shelf welded on the back to I can tote bags and tools all around the place. This small neat and tidy house built by the postmaster in Birdseye all out of Red Oak milled at the mill just down the road, came with the usual huge 4,000 square foot metal shop/ barn 5 garage including 220 a bath room, wood stove, party room and down a separate driveway along side the house. Oh yes and besides 6 huge electric doors it has a deer hanging locker. .

Now how  I insured that I can live alone here forever and prosper is  priceless.  Rodger was not a country boy coming home to  hunt and fish and chew tobacco and spit around a wood stove with old men. He was a running at night on concrete chasing bad guys city fellow full on Viet Nam vet marine and  34 year California State Parole officer.  When Imet him he was just retired 59 year old Book Store Owner in Lake of the Woods Ca.  He bought me this place and a Book Store for him a neighboring town and never even pretended to lift a finger in any kind of home maintence.  First thing he did after stockingthe book store he found me a handy man. From that handy man after ten years here I had parlyed him into a 35 year old hot shot first responder married two little kids local boy makes good Landscape contractor who started his own company the year Rdger died.  He has that big building and will inherit the would shooting match when I die.  If I do. .

In return for my rent free price, he maintains me. It’s an awful job but we seem to thrive on it. He maintains everything .  When I call 911 I get himand his buddies anyway. With out him I would never have been able to keep Rodger at home til  he died. So based on his track record Todd  I am assured  that we can keep this boat afloat forever. Cool huh?.

Every morning I wake up to the sound of seven guys pulling in  whooping it up ready to pour concrete or and landscape the new what ever.  I’m a big  part of’ life’ with all these blue collar rednecks as they  call themselves, coming and going.  The sound of heavy equipment has always excited me. Sweat and muscle  is good too..

And it gets better for me.  A couple of years ago my youngest son Joel Ret. Lt Col. Joel Wilson working out of the Pentagon living in a high rise in DC., that’d be empty nester  Joel and wife, bought for a song a destroyed around the world huge custom build trawler for the people who owned yachting  magazine off a mud flat post Katrina. He has spent many years restoring it.  Some in dry dock most himself when he is in the country,.He dissembled  the engine room, took it to his house in San Antonio and painted it .As I type he is in Jordan. It is a beauty. Three state rooms, two heads and a salon big enough to dance in. Right now it is in dry dock in Savannah. He and his brothers and there wives and friends have taken it from  Houston Tx. to the Caribbean and up the coast toward DC.  Insurance wise he tells me it is cheaper to put it in dry dock in hurricane season. .

This is not a new life for me this boatthing. My father raced the Bermuda race. My Mother sailed every chance she got. I bought a 25 foot French built day sailor wit my first paycheck from the Santa Barbara Welfare Dept. in 1969. The husband who raised my children and I lived aboard a converted kand ing craft in the SB harbor for a few years while we raced midget ocean racing up and down the coast My son Matt races J boats. T hey say your past comes back to haunt you. Okay now when Todd needs a break or I do I have  a boat to go to. I do not see myself sailing the big oceans any more but maybe flying to spend time on the boat when they are in Paradise? And fishing for big fish again? Yes! Bring it..

Hope this gets to you. Still in ice? How’s by you and everyone else? .

Judy Wilson