Sans Parents for Eight Years

I’m pretty good at math.  But sometimes when I figure things out, they just don’t seem right.  This year is one of those times.  Can it really be eight years since both of my parents passed away within a week of each other?  As the Magic 8 Ball would say, “All signs point to yes.”  Where did that come from?  I must have just had the number 8 on my mind.  Time sure flies by.

I’ve been thinking of them – and the fact that I’d write a post about this – all week.  I always have to have a great picture of them to go with the post, right?  I was thinking that since this is the 8th anniversary of their deaths, I might coordinate that with a photo from around their 8th wedding anniversary.  When would that have been?  Let me tell you.  Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry, Jr. married Betty Lou Bucklin on November 1, 1952, in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  That would put their 8th anniversary on November 1, 1960, which happens to be the day after I was born. 

They didn’t take an anniversary photo that year, because my mom was still in the hospital with me.  I was the fifth child, and I have A+ blood.  My mom was 0- and had built up antibodies from previous pregnancies with A+ children.  Her immune system fought my blood, and it resulted in me having to have a blood transfusion a few days after I was born.  Thank you, Methodist men’s group in Lake Charles!  So, I messed up my parents’ anniversary and I didn’t want to use my own baby photo for the post today.

I thought I’d look back on the past posts to make sure I didn’t repeat a photo.  Last year I stated that I wasn’t going to use the 2nd anniversary photo of my parents because I would post it later in the year for the 70th anniversary of the photo.  And guess what I forgot to do in November?  That’s right, I forgot about using that photo.  So that settled it.  I’m using the photo of my mom and dad from their 2nd wedding anniversary.

Look how sweet it is.  My mom is wearing the dress that she made and got married in.  I’ve described the color of it before, which is difficult to do, but I resisted showing the photo before because I wanted to wait until the photo was 70 years old.  Like I said, I was going to post it in November 2024.  So now you can see it in full color.  Reddish brown?  Brownish red?  It’s not easy to say for sure.

As far as their deaths are concerned, my mom died on January 19, 2017, and my dad died five days later (January 24, 2017).  We had a joint funeral for them on January 28, 2017, at the Our Lady Help of Christians Catholic Church in Jennings, Louisiana.  Jennings was where they lived most of their lives and it’s where they’re buried.

Those that loved them miss them.