Gordon Schoewe (1926-20140
Sometimes you just need to take a deep breath and consider your priorities. Take last Saturday, for instance. When all was said and done, it wasn’t the fact that my website (and dozens of others, apparently) had been hacked that should stick in our minds. Not at all. The important part of Saturday, July 23, 2016 was that it would have been Gordon Schoewe’s 90th birthday!
We celebrated that right here in our garden by hosting yet another ‘Gordon’s Annual Memorial Birthday Picnic’. Eleven of us gathered to toast Gordon, to sing him ‘Happy Birthday’ in absentia, and to share some memories of our larger-than-life friend who we miss more than we can say! Only four of us were part of Gordon and Roy’s original “picnic group” which began back in the seventies. Others joined forces with us over the years. And, it goes without saying, that we all still share Gordon’s mantra, “any excuse for a picnic!”
Nyel, Jim, Gordon – Birthday Picnic 1992
Nyel fired up the barbecue and offered everyone a choice – burgers, brats, or hot dogs. Never mind that the plate of lettuce, tomato, and onion slices didn’t make it out of the refrigerator until after the first burgers had already been eaten. It was a simple matter to just have another one, this time with trimmings! There were salads and chips and cookies and… martinis for anyone who so desired – which turned out to be only one person. (Some things do change!)
We talked about memorable picnics – the birthday picnics with the pink-blow-up-birthday-cake complete-with-candles, the spur-of-the-moment picnics at Loomis Lake State Park when we all brought whatever we could grab, and the rainy-day-inside-the-house-picnics when Gordon scattered little plastic ants around on the carpet to make things feel authentic!
A Toast to Gordon!
And, inevitably, we remembered the many people in addition to ‘Gore and Roar’ who were part of the ’Picnic Group’ but are no longer with us – Dottie and Lee McHugh, Betty Newell, Jim Buesing, Charles Mulvey, Marge Horner, Crazy Cousin Jeannie, Dorothy and Chuck Huggins, to name a few. We are confident that they, too, were picnicking in the Great Beyond! After all, it would have been Gordon’s 90th and the best-ever excuse for a picnic!
Wonderful memories! As long as we remember and celebrate loved ones they are ever close.