The Graduation Wish

Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.

Robert Frost

Son #3 in an oncologist. Last winter his three-year-old son asked for “comfy chair in comfy shade” for Christmas. His parents searched the internet and eventually found a cabana-style chair designed for children. It has two seats with a canvas roof. His mom sent pictures of him sitting on their patio “reading” in the comfy shade of his “comfy chair.” Two weeks ago, my son’s profession and his son’s request became linked forever in our family history.

It began when Daughter #1 walked across the podium at BYU, earning her PhD In Educational Psychology. When I asked her what she wanted for graduation present, she grinned and said, “a swimming pool.” I offered to head to a big box store and get her a fancy plastic one, the kind with sparkles in the tubing around the edges. That wasn’t exactly what she had in mind, so she began to save.

It took eleven years, but now there is a 16’x 40’ pool in our backyard, complete with a diving board, a hot tub, and a slide. There are representatives of my 27 grand kids and neighborhood children splashing in the blue water most everyday—it even has “sparkles” (I remind her that’s my contribution) when the sun is high overhead.

But Daughter #1 kept insisting that her graduation wish wasn’t finished. She wanted a small covered patio so that the women in the family could lifeguard their children without acquiring severe sunburns in the process. She tried a popup shade, which Sons #s 3 and 4 were happy to provide—their contributions featuring red canopies with U of U insignia all over them. Neither the West Jordan wind, nor the BYU graduate were thrilled with this solution.

Son #5’s father-in-law is a retired Jordan School District carpenter and a gifted artist with wood. He volunteered to build a pavilion if Daughter #1 would foot the bill. She did, and he did. Since he’s close to my age, he enlisted the aid of Daughter #2’s husband (confused yet? Big families make for complicated relationships), who had a few days off his day job. It took a week or two, but a lovely sloped-roof structure designed to shelter adults from the sometimes-fierce afternoon sun materialized on the west end of the pool. All Daughter #1’s siblings got together and contributed a dozen weather-proof chairs. Sons #s 4 and 6 hung lights. And voila! Food and games and laughter echo from it most every night.

But still Daughter #1 insisted her goal was not complete. It needed a formal dedication. One afternoon 10 days ago, she bought 4 stainless steel screws at Lowe’s, asked Son #6 to grab his power drill, and provided a small engraved plaque to be mounted on the center support for her new pavilion. On it is this simple inscription:

This pavilion is dedicated to the memory of

James Stewart Voorhies (2008)
Kendall McKay Frazier (2013)
Colleen Barben Loosli (2014)
Roberta (Bobbi) Elizabeth Loosli (2017)

We love you and miss you;
we can’t wait to sit in a comfy chair
under a comfy shade with you again

James Stewart Voorhies is my Son #2; he died from the complications of chronic, hard-core drug abuse when he was 33.

Kendall McKay Frazier is the cousin of Son #4’s wife; a nurse, he died from colon cancer in his early 20’s.

Colleen Barber Loosli died of pancreatic cancer only a few months after she retired as a high school teacher from Jordan School District. She is the mother of Son #5’s wife; her husband built our pavilion.

Roberta (Bobbi) Elizabeth Loosli is the sister-in-law of Son #5 and his wife. She died of breast cancer about 2 1/2 years after her mother-in-law.

Three of these four losses in our family were the direct result of a disease which Son #3 battles every day. Perhaps his small son knows something we do not: a reunion with “a comfy chair in the comfy shade” is nearer than we think.