Colorado whirlwind

We left at 7:30 Friday morning and drove to Colorado Springs, in order to be there for my Aunt Judy's memorial service.

She passed away a year and a half ago, but her family had her memorial yesterday in her beloved Colorado.

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/name/judith-hassed-obituary?pid=1000000177246480&view=guestbook

I was able to get a day off from work, but no more, so we made the drive.

I am so pleased that I was able to be there.

My Auntie J (as she signed her cards and letters to me) was a hero to me.

One of my first EVER "what I want to be when I grow up" statements was "HORSE BREEDER."  See the obit to understand the significance....

She lost her husband when her four children were all pretty young, in 1962 (when I was 8 months old), but she kept on pursuing her dreams and doing her thing, no matter what.

My dad always described her as "cantankerous," but to me, she was fearless and strong.

She and her husband moved from Illinois to Colorado in 1953, so she raised her kids there, mostly.

In June of 1966, when I was 4, we went on our only BIG family vacation to Colorado and New Mexico.

During that trip, we visited Aunt Judy and the kids in Greeley, Colorado.

I have no idea how many days we were there, but one of the days, when I had been put down for my nap on the living room couch, my Aunt brought the family's Shetland pony, Sonny, INTO the living room to wake me up.

She and my dad put me on the pony, and let me ride him out of the living room, onto the front porch.

There are pictures somewhere, I am sure, but I have not seen them for LITERALLY decades.

That little visit to Greeley started me on the road to being a horse-obsessed adolescent.

In the early 70's, Judy and the kids (and horses and dogs and cats) moved back to Illinois for a few years.

Judy went to the University of Chicago (from which her mother, my grandmother, had graduated) during that time for some graduate studies in Latin and Greek, I think.

She wanted to make herself more employable as a single mother.  Her obituary says she was able to be employed as a school secretary with her higher degree....

All I remember is that she became a successful Rottweiler breeder.

During the few years that they lived a couple of suburbs away from us, I spent a LOT of time at her house, learning how to care for and ride horses from my cousin Anne, and hanging out in my Aunt Judy's kitchen.

I remember one time, when I had been dropped off in her care, she loaded me into her big Suburban or whatever it was, and we took a long, circuitous route down country roads (yes, there were some back then) to go get ice cream.

I wish I could remember what she talked about with me during that trip, but I can't remember specifics, only that it happened, and it made me love her more.

Her kids grew up and she moved back to Colorado, and then eventually lived in Arkansas, and even Oklahoma, but Colorado was where her heart was.

But anyway.... it was really an honor to be there to say that I REMEMBER her, and I always will, and for me to represent the family of her big brother.

After 22 out of the last 72 hours having been spent in the car, I am off to take a bubble bath.  That Monday morning alarm is going to go off WAY too soon.