Love and Loss with Dian Belbeck

What holds when life breaks? We open with laughter and choir talk, then walk straight into the real stuff—addiction, loss, and the kind of faith that doesn’t flinch. Diane shares how three packs a day turned into a toilet-side promise, how a morning “first thought” anchors her day, and why purpose is more comforting than a rigid, missable plan. That reframe becomes a lifeline as we trace her family’s story from small-town Texas to a COVID night with brutal odds, a global circle of prayer, and an unmistakable turn toward life.

We spend time with “Daddy Gerald,” the father whose hugs and hymns formed a fearless heart. Then we meet Jessica through stories that are both irreverent and reverent—rare lymphoma, ten months of fierce love, board games in the other room, hymns at the bedside, and an unforgettable wave as the gurney rolled down the drive. No euphemisms, no empty platitudes. Just honest grief, a living hope, and the stubborn humor that makes space to breathe. Along the way we talk habits and holiness, phones and first hours, aging and agency, and how to keep friends close enough to carry you when your own strength runs dry.

If you’ve ever felt anxious about “missing God’s plan,” this conversation offers a gentler, stronger vision: trust the purpose that can redeem anything. Expect a few belly laughs, a few tears, and practical ways to anchor your mornings, your holidays, and your faith. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs courage tonight, and leave a review to tell us where purpose found you.

Transcript

Cold Opens, Banter, And Guest Welcome

SPEAKER_00 0:14

I was gonna ask you about that. About who lives there, but we'll get into that. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 0:20

We're in it.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Oh, we're in it. Hey, welcome to my podcast. It's mine now. Did you know that? I know, of course. How weird is that? I know not.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

No, I think now I think that's how it should be.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Now I'm hot. See, I put socks in my armpits. Because it's a Sadie shirt.

SPEAKER_02 0:35

You can see them.

SPEAKER_00 0:36

Can you?

SPEAKER_02 0:36

Yeah, just hold your can you can you see my socks?

SPEAKER_00 0:40

I thought about doing pads like maxi pads. No, but this is a Sadie shirt and I can't sweat in it. And these podcasts make me sweat. Really? Yes. As he's pointed out before. I lifted my arm. He's like, what the heck? Okay.

SPEAKER_02 0:55

Now if you lift your well, you got fuzz over there. Is that sock fuzz?

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Oh, I don't know. No, it's probably not.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

Okay, so I want to know about it. Talk to me about sock fuzz. Sock fuzz. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

I am so happy that my one of my favorite people in the world is here today.

SPEAKER_01 1:14

Jeremy.

SPEAKER_00 1:15

Jeremy.

SPEAKER_02 1:16

Yeah, no, you're higher on the list.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 1:19

I might have made the list.

SPEAKER_00 1:21

You guys are so lucky to get to meet Diane Bellbeck today.

SPEAKER_02 1:24

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

The small handful of people that listen to this are gonna love you. I'm so excited for them to meet you. I've been gatekeeping Diane, I've been gatekeeping, not letting everybody know you. Because I wanted to keep you. But here we are.

SPEAKER_01 1:40

That's funny. Thank you. Thanks for coming. Glad to be here. Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

You made it over from the first great Christmas present.

SPEAKER_01 1:47

I heard it from the first great Christmas present where the pop song was The Kwanzaa song. Something about Kwanzaa. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 1:54

Is it predominantly a black school?

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Oh gosh, no.

unknown 1:58

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

My favorite thing about this school, she goes to um uh Poplar Grove. Okay, and so we have a seventh grader and an eighth grader that are also there that are in the choir program. And their choir teacher, I mean, first of all, he's fabulous. But he in every concert they have at least one song that is from another country. I love that. And an in another uh language that is so good for those kids.

SPEAKER_02 2:28

Is Quanta from another country?

SPEAKER_00 2:30

No, but it's you know it's a holiday from another mother.

SPEAKER_02 2:35

It really is.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Is that okay to say? I don't think it is. I think I don't know what our black audience is like.

SPEAKER_02 2:42

Look, if I'm not canceled already, I know what your black audience is like.

SPEAKER_00 2:45

Do you?

SPEAKER_02 2:46

And that's small.

SPEAKER_00 2:48

Probably small because are you talking about small people or a small in number? Probably both. I mean, if if you stumbled on this, you might be a child. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 2:58

You don't have many little black people.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Well, because okay, but also my name just immediately they're like You're a Jennifer. I'm a Jennifer. Even though I saw a black Jennifer on a thing the other day, I was like, oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 3:12

The thing is about Kwanzaa, I if Do you think black people want Kwanzaa?

SPEAKER_01 3:20

No.

SPEAKER_02 3:20

Okay, that's where I'm at.

SPEAKER_01 3:22

No, I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 3:23

I mean not I mean our listeners could probably tell.

SPEAKER_01 3:25

No, I don't know, but I think the several that I have talked to are like you know black people? I do. Not counting. Not just small black people.

SPEAKER_02 3:35

Not just Carthy. No, not just no, not just Carthy's blacker than most black people.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

She is. No, she's not.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

But I mean skin tone. She's got the best skin.

SPEAKER_01 3:48

She does.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

Oh, my gosh. Oh my gosh. Yeah, it's wrong.

SPEAKER_02 3:53

It's if black don't crack, Indian doesn't do anything.

SPEAKER_00 3:57

Doesn't do Indian nothing. Yeah, it's not. I don't know. Anyway, well, Diane's here. How when did I I think I met you when I yeah, but I don't think I really met you until I was throwing Janelle, my sister Janelle's bridal shower. I think that's when we really met. And then we bonded over the marinated cheese that you made.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

We did.

SPEAKER_00 4:18

That was amazing. It was pretty fabulous, I have to say. Have you made it lately?

SPEAKER_01 4:22

I haven't.

SPEAKER_00 4:23

It's so good.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

It is so very good. Marinated cheese. I'm trying, yeah, from some mountain village place that I got the recipe from. I have no idea.

SPEAKER_00 4:36

A mountain like appellation? What are we talking about?

SPEAKER_01 4:39

Yeah, yeah, like a like a retreat. Not a retreat, but like a fancy dancy place. Not any place that I would ever go to.

SPEAKER_00 4:46

I when you say a mountain village, I'm thinking backwoods. No, no. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 4:53

Is it from Texas?

SPEAKER_00 4:54

No. Tennessee.

SPEAKER_02 4:56

You you actually okay. I just realized this. I've been knowing you for how many 20 some years. Well, how long have Janine Brian been married? You don't really have a West Texas accent. It sounds more Tennessee.

Small-Town Texas And Feed Yard Life

SPEAKER_01 5:10

Yeah. I well, we've been here 20 something years, but I never really had uh much of a Texas twine. Right. Where are you from in Texas?

SPEAKER_00 5:18

Tell everybody. Hereford, Texas. Hereford. And where's that?

SPEAKER_02 5:22

Is it Amarillo?

SPEAKER_00 5:24

It is 48 miles from Amarillo, yes. 48 miles further out, no, uh east of Amarillo.

SPEAKER_02 5:32

I only know that because one time we were on the road, and you must have been tracking us somehow. And you texted me and said you're going to Amarillo. And I texted you, I have no idea what George Strait's hurry was. Because this place, yeah, it is it's there's nothing out there.

SPEAKER_01 5:51

Okay, my my town is named Hereford after the cows.

SPEAKER_00 5:55

After the cow, right?

SPEAKER_01 5:56

And it is uh Herford is one of the we it's one of the largest um feed yards in the U.S. I mean, there are like five or six Oh, like they're they're everywhere. As soon as you get within just a few miles, you can begin to smell it. I had Oh, I bet I had uncles that owned two feed yards and they smelled so bad. And when I was a kid, we would talk about how bad they smell, and my dopey uncles would go, That's just the smell of money. No, it's not. It's the smell of cow poop.

SPEAKER_00 6:30

That is not money. Money to them, though.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

So yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:34

Is that where the cars are sticking out of the ground? Amarellius. Okay, that's what I thought.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

What are they Cadillacs? Cadillac.

SPEAKER_02 6:41

I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

That's a good name.

SPEAKER_02 6:42

I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 6:43

I don't know either. Well that tells me.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

I remember driving by it and going, Oh, there's that.

SPEAKER_00 6:47

There's that. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:49

That tells you a lot about the people there. I mean, really, if that's how you spent your time is bigging digging holes that you bury Cadillacs upright.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

Well, why did why? I don't know. I wonder what I never knew what the purpose of that is. So you were in you grew up there. I did. Yeah. When did you leave there?

SPEAKER_01 7:09

As soon as I could. It was it was a fabulous, honestly, it was a fabulous place to grow up. It really was. I those were what I refer to as Holocaun years. They were um it was just it was just great.

SPEAKER_02 7:26

I don't know what that word means.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

Yeah, what does that mean? Like the most fabulous of everything, just sweet times. And um I mean, we were there were only maybe 10,000 people in town, and I was kin to like 9,888 of them. Wow. And that's just so fun. It is fun. And you know what the other thing is? When I was a kid, I thought it was bad. As an adult, I I missed this. Everybody knew what you were doing. Yeah. If I did anything wrong, somebody was watching. And would tell. Did you do stuff wrong though? Were you a I did, but not much. Were you you weren't a wild child? I wasn't well I did with the smoke and the cigarettes, but other than that.

SPEAKER_02 8:14

Where were you in the birth order?

SPEAKER_01 8:16

The only. Oh you're an oath.

SPEAKER_00 8:18

You were an only.

Smoking, Addiction, And Quitting By Faith

SPEAKER_01 8:19

We adopt we adopted my brother when I was twelve.

SPEAKER_02 8:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 8:23

But yeah, I was the only. I was an only.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

What'd you smoke?

SPEAKER_01 8:26

Started out with larks because I thought they were so cute. Because of the packaging? Yeah. Totally because of the packaging. But I quickly changed from that. I uh I went from that to Marlborough Reds. And I smoked. I quit smoking in 82. I smoked all that time, and by the time I stopped smoking, I was smoking three packs a day. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:52

That's a lot, isn't it? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:54

Well, especially packs a day. Especially Marlboro's. I mean, holy moly. That's like full-leaded, right? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 9:00

Do you miss it?

SPEAKER_01 9:01

I do.

SPEAKER_02 9:02

Yeah. Mom does too. Mom says as soon as she gets to heaven, she's gonna smoke with Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 9:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:07

You and her.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

Yeah, yeah. You two can smoke. We'll meet together and smoke. Smoke breaks. Smoke it up. I uh yeah. And I like I've had experiences like um we were living in Oklahoma City, and I pulled up to a light. I had stopped smoking maybe it maybe been two or three years, and I pulled up to a light, and there was a guy in the car next to me. It was in the summer, windows were down, and he was smoking, and the smoke kind of wafted over into my car. And I literally sat there and thought through the scenario of what would happen if I opened my car door, jumped over, took because I could see the cigarettes, and they were my cigarettes. They were yours. They were marbarous. And I could see them on the seat. And what would happen if I did that and just grabbed them and took them back to my car and drove off and just hotboxed? I mean, you know, I and then I thought to myself, that is really, I'd already known before then, but I thought to myself, I I I have an addictive personality if I would consider doing that for cigarettes. Yeah. So, but I have never, and you know what? That's one of the few dreams that I have recurring. I I dream that I have smoked and I wake up crying. I am I am so sad because I promised the Lord once I stopped that I would never smoke again. And it's it is so real to me that it's like I broke my promise to him. Like he, I mean, really, there are so many other things that Jesus is concerned about that are not whether or not I recently smoked. He's like, I'm watching. It's like the song. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:08

That's funny that that is a fear of yours.

SPEAKER_01 11:10

Isn't that weird?

SPEAKER_02 11:11

I never dreamed that she cheats on me. I you do though. You know, you have. I have I have. I I shouldn't say never, I have. But uh thankfully it's not hasn't happened in a very long time. But my recurring dreams were that I cheated on her. Oh gosh. And I woke up more I mean, I was just like, oh my gosh, I you know, I ruined it. It is.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

It's uh if it is something that you feel strongly about, if you feel like you have broken that, of course, breaking a vow to Jennifer is more than me smoking a cigarette, but but it is it it feels so very real. And it is I'm glad that it happens periodic periodically because it reminds me I don't I don't think we recognize what our I don't think we think our sin is very bad most of the time. I think most of the time we kind of think, uh, well, you know, that wasn't so good, but it's not so bad. But when I have that dream, there is this recognition, and it's not because smoking a cigarette is so bad, that's not it. Right. But it's that I told him I wouldn't.

SPEAKER_00 12:23

It was your commitment. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:25

You gotta stay on this. You gotta be talking right into that. Okay. Because if you're gonna say good stuff like that, we won't be able to hear it. How long do you think she's gonna bark?

SPEAKER_00 12:35

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 12:36

Because you can really hear it in that video.

SPEAKER_00 12:38

Can you?

SPEAKER_02 12:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:39

Should we just let her meet Diane?

SPEAKER_02 12:41

Who?

SPEAKER_00 12:41

It's Bailey.

SPEAKER_02 12:42

It is Bailey. No, well, let's let's give her another.

SPEAKER_00 12:45

Or should we send Sadie in to get Bailey and take her in?

SPEAKER_02 12:50

I mean, if you yell at her while she's talking.

SPEAKER_00 12:52

No, I don't think so.

SPEAKER_02 12:53

I mean, you works with Winnie.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Winnie's not bargaining.

SPEAKER_02 12:57

Bailey!

SPEAKER_00 13:00

Bailey's not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Let's just say that.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Hey, your sister might listen to this. I doubt it. No, she doesn't. Never mind.

SPEAKER_00 13:07

I highly doubt it.

SPEAKER_02 13:08

She's well, Brian won't, so we don't have to whether at that. We're a bad influence on Janelle.

SPEAKER_00 13:14

I know exactly what you're referring to.

SPEAKER_02 13:16

So uh hey, you know, smoking is coming back, actually. I have a lot of friends that are doing it. One of my friends, his wife thinks it's super sexy when he smokes.

SPEAKER_00 13:27

Isn't that gross?

SPEAKER_01 13:28

Well, not only is it gross, if you kiss somebody who has just had a cigarette, it is a nasty, nasty thing.

SPEAKER_02 13:37

I wouldn't know.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

Did Bika smoke? Yes, he did. In fact, he smoked longer than I did. I quit. I quit a little before him. He quit. You quit and he kept going? Well, he quit for a little while and then he started back again. I my dad had leukemia. And I'd never had anybody in my family that was sick, sick or anything. So shortly after he died, I began having this recurring fear that I was gonna that I had cancer of some sort. I didn't, you know, I just didn't know. It was just there. Sure. And so I uh I was reading a book late at night. I had long ago gone. I I mean it was just, you know, it was like, I don't know, 2 30 in the morning, but I just couldn't put it down. It was so wonderful. I just kept reading, kept reading, and I needed to go to the bathroom so bad. So I'm like sitting on my foot. Oh my gosh. Because I still wouldn't go. Yes, exactly. Because I just if I if I can just read one more chapter, one more chapter, one more chapter, whatever. And so finally I couldn't wait any longer. So I get up, run to the bathroom, and when I get up, I'm dizzy. And I sit down and I'm really dizzy, and I know because I'm not stupid, I well, generally, I know that it's because I jumped up. It it's it's just made my head funky. But I sat there and I thought, okay, I I can't keep living like this. I hate this, that everything that happens to me, if I stump my toe, I think I have cancer, all that. So I sat on the toilet and said, the Lord and I have done a lot of business in funky places. And I just said, if you will help me, I will stop. But I can't do it unless you help me. Stop what? Smoking.

SPEAKER_03 15:29

Okay.

Habits, Phones, And Morning Anchors

SPEAKER_01 15:30

So I had cigarettes on my bed stand. And when I woke up in the morning, the first thing I did was light up. So I woke up that morning and I said, Okay, Laura, I can't I can't do this unless you help me. This one cigarette, this first cigarette, I won't I won't smoke if you'll help me. And I did that for three days. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Oh man.

SPEAKER_01 15:54

Every time I wanted a cigarette, I would say, No, I choose you.

SPEAKER_02 15:57

Is that first morning one hard? I've heard that a cup of coffee and a cigarette in the morning is glorious.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

Yes. The only thing better is if you've had a fabulous meal.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

Really? Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:07

But yeah, the coffee and the cigarette, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:09

I had a friend tell me, he's like, Man, I that I can't give up.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Yeah. It it yeah. So uh and things, funky things happened. I mean, I had my mom and I did some things together, and mother knew that I smoked, but I wasn't. Oh, you didn't she didn't really know. No, I never told her. I mean, she just kind of knew.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

I mean, surely she could smell it and whatever. Yeah. You're if you're smoking three packs a day, yeah. How are you hiding it? Well, okay.

SPEAKER_01 16:39

I mean, that's like a constant I was I was in BSF at the time and I played the piano for the for the whole group. So when we left in the mornings, okay, we're pulling out of the parking lot, and suddenly I'm driving and I disappear. Because I have leaned down to light up.

SPEAKER_02 17:01

That's something.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

I'm telling you.

SPEAKER_02 17:04

So what'd you do with your hands after? Like, isn't it partly like something to do with your hands all the time?

SPEAKER_01 17:11

But I I I I think that it I I think probably everybody is it's different. I I loved the way cigarettes tasted. I loved the way they made me feel.

SPEAKER_02 17:25

You know, you say you have a I've heard people say that they have a personality that's like given to addiction. I I haven't talked to anybody who isn't prone to something.

SPEAKER_01 17:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

Like that's true, you know, that I think it just you pick your poison kind of.

SPEAKER_03 17:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:43

I mean, I can I can uh alcohol does nothing for me.

SPEAKER_04 17:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:49

But solitaire on my phone.

unknown 17:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:51

Oh Diane, I looked, so I downloaded Solitaire. I mean, I've downloaded Solitaire since phones came out, and then I'll delete it, download it, delete it. So I downloaded uh I remembered when I did it, because Hutch's girlfriend from Europe was in town. So this is two two and a half years ago. And so I went and looked at the time. I was like, how much time has I have I spent playing solitaire on my phone? Now, granted, I'm on a lot of flights and stuff, so you gotta give me that. But I have spent 40 days in the past two and a half years.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 18:32

Yeah, it goes seconds, minutes, hours, and if you see how much he loses. Yeah, I play the little Vegas style, you know, where it's almost impossible to win. I mean, I just love it. I mean, every time I go to the bathroom when I'm when there's nothing to do, you know, I it's it's like smoking. I mean, I I love to have a good meal and then play on my phone.

SPEAKER_01 18:59

Well, I I do think, because we're human, all all of us there is a built-in something in all of us.

SPEAKER_02 19:08

Here's the thing. I was thinking about this yesterday. Do you guys think I I don't know why I was thinking about preaching and teaching and whether I know that it matters. Bible teaching is really important. But I don't know that it matters. This is, you know, in the training for what I do, the my teachers for the for the uh the the people that I learned it from. And it was a really long program, but they had a couple of things that they they were kind of like informers for everything. And one of them was people don't listen to what you tell them, they learn by experience. So as a spiritual director, you help people have experiences with the Lord because discovery is how people learn. And so I've been thinking about all this, and I was trying to think if if a preacher Said something I really enjoy, like solitaire was a sin, would I stop? And if I'm honest, no. You know what I mean? I'd have to somehow exp like would you stop listening if preacher on Sunday morning said, don't listen to political podcasts, they're not good for you. Would you would you even consider stopping?

SPEAKER_00 20:22

I would think you don't know.

SPEAKER_02 20:24

Right.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

I know better than you. You don't know. Yeah. If you just knew the truth. So it had to come from you having a fear. Like it had to come from you being terrified.

SPEAKER_02 20:36

Yeah, no preacher could have told you stop smoking. No. You'd have been like, it's too fun.

SPEAKER_00 20:42

Yeah. Because I'm sure you've heard preachers saying, Oh my gosh, yes.

SPEAKER_01 20:45

And I I can't tell you how many times I had quit over the years.

SPEAKER_02 20:49

And preachers, they tell people don't have sex. That means nothing.

unknown 20:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:54

I mean, I think if you teach the Bible and you have an experience, well, I mean, look, we we have preachers that listen to this, and I don't want to discount any of them because if you're teaching the Bible and the Lord speaks to you, that's different. But just telling somebody, hey, Bible says it, it's wrong.

SPEAKER_00 21:10

Ah, that's that's just not the way to affect change. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

Absolutely is not. It absolutely is not.

SPEAKER_02 21:18

Well, that you put it well. That is what I mean.

SPEAKER_01 21:21

Yeah. Because the I think the whole like for me the the line was that I knew myself well enough to know who this I'm okay. This is really straightforward here. Uh I put cigarettes above everything else.

SPEAKER_02 21:45

Did you? Is that what's wrong with it? Because you're allowed to I drink Diet Coke. It's not good for me.

SPEAKER_01 21:51

No, that's for me. I don't know about for everybody else. For me, that was what was wrong.

SPEAKER_02 21:56

Okay.

Her Dad, “Daddy Gerald,” And Family Legacy

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Is that when I say to you the first thing I did do I did in the morning was reach for those cigarettes, that was I've always had struggled with my weight. When I smoked, I never had to worry about my weight. Right. Yeah. Okay. So I would use that for the excuse. Oh, sure.

SPEAKER_02 22:17

Well, is it better to smoke or to be super fat?

SPEAKER_01 22:21

Neither. The the the better thing is to take good care of yourself.

SPEAKER_02 22:25

Right. I get that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:27

And it took me a long time to get to that place. But that that was for me, that was the wrong about cigarettes.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

But Diane, I up until yesterday would wake up and reach for my phone immediately.

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Yesterday?

SPEAKER_00 22:44

Yesterday. Remember, I told you yesterday was the first day that I put it in the other room in a long, long time.

SPEAKER_02 22:49

And here's how you I heard you say that. I didn't realize that was the first day. But yes to this morning I didn't either. I didn't look at my phone until I came down.

SPEAKER_00 22:58

I'm trying to not look at my phone for the first 60 minutes of the day. Okay. And so, because, you know, research, blah, blah, blah, all the things. It's good for you. So 11. But I'm just saying, like most people use their phone as an alarm clock and immediately turn off your alarm clock, and while it's in your hand, you check your email, you check your messages, you check your Instagram. You know what I mean? So 11 a.m. Is it any different? Is what I'm saying. Shut up.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

No, I think it's I think it's probably not. If it if it is, again, it's the whole thing of what place on the list of priorities does that fall?

SPEAKER_00 23:42

Well, I heard um, do you know Lisa Bevere? Uh-huh. Her and her son. Well, I don't know her personally, but I kind of do, because she would come into the store I was working at, and she's awesome. Yeah. I love her. Anyway, her and her son were talking on a her podcast, and he just wrote a book. Um, I forget what it's called. Words with God, I think. But he did all this research, and that's where I got this about how when you're in that in-between space of kind of awake, kind of asleep, that God really speaks to you, and you know, and your brain just can process a lot of stuff at that time. And so when we immediately pick up our phone, it turns all of that off and we immediately wake up. Yeah. Yeah. And so, anyway.

SPEAKER_01 24:22

You know, I uh I do this thing, I don't know. I started doing it with Jessica when Jessica was sick, when she first got sick, is when I started doing it. And I just continued. Um, and so every morning, as soon as I get up, instead of going to my phone, this sounds real holy. I'm not trying to sound holy. I'm just telling you what I do.

SPEAKER_02 24:47

I I saw a literal halo when you walked in the door.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

Doesn't surprise me.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

And it wasn't your hair.

SPEAKER_01 24:58

Yeah, there's not enough of that to make much of a halo halo. Okay, so I um I started doing this thing um called which I called Morning's First Thought.

SPEAKER_02 25:11

And it's I you used to send them out.

SPEAKER_01 25:13

I I still do.

SPEAKER_02 25:14

Do you?

SPEAKER_01 25:15

I want them. But well, you you just they're they're on they're on Facebook, and Facebook and I are kind of in a fight.

SPEAKER_00 25:23

Oh, I'm not on Facebook.

SPEAKER_01 25:24

Well, I mean, by saying we're in a fight is half the time they don't put what you put down. So anyway, this is what I do. I go to the Word, it's not any specific place. I just kind of flip a little bit or the Lord remind me of something that I really like. I'll go to that, I'll read it, I'll copy it, I put it on Facebook under Morning's First Thought, and then I skip a couple of spaces, and then I just write about what I what that means to me. What that yeah, if there's something in that scripture that has really spoken to me, or and sometimes I'll go through periods of time where I'll do hymns, I mean, and sometimes a little poetry, but basically it's scripture, and I I recognize that if I when I don't do that, my day is a little wonky. But when I start my day with that, it's not like you know, well, golly, I I sure did a good thing and this is a great day. But it de it sets the anchor for my day.

SPEAKER_02 26:38

I was just about to say it's an anchor for me too.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

That's so good.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

And I I have met people before that they're they have a different relationship with the Lord, they stay anchored in a different way. But man, if I don't do it, I something just doesn't feel right. No. I've even thought to myself, you know, I'm gonna take Sundays off because I'm gonna go to church and it just feels weird.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

Yeah, it's not, and it and it is there is a there is a distance in my relationship with him if I don't start my day like that. It it's kind of like you and your best friend are not you, you're not in a fight, but there's just it's there's just something kind of funky. You don't feel close. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:25

So did leukemia ultimately kill your dad? Yes. Because I knew he died, and I remember because I remember we were meeting one day at Starbucks, and a a funeral went by, and she stood up. Well, I didn't know you're supposed to stand up. I know you pull over and you explain to me about your dad's you can tell that exactly.

SPEAKER_02 27:44

Was he great?

SPEAKER_00 27:45

Oh.

SPEAKER_01 27:47

What every father should be. I mean, it's the best. I mean, really, I I don't ever remember a time that I did not absolutely adore him. He loved the Lord, he loved people, he was the best hugger in the whole world. I mean, really, I have a lot of cousins, and and they all start his name was Gerald. And so to all of them, he was Daddy Gerald. And I mean, on his birthday, it's coming up at the end of the month, this month, um, I get text from all of them what what I would give for a Daddy Gerald hug.

SPEAKER_02 28:24

I love that.

Illness, Prayer, And A COVID Turning Point

SPEAKER_01 28:25

But he was just um in unspoken ways, he let me know that I could do anything I wanted to do. I mean, that I was capable. I think he thought I probably could have been brain surgeon if I wanted to be. We all know not so. But um, and he was a singer, he loved to sing. Um, we sang at church together, according to how old I was, was according to how many coat boxes I had to stand on so I could get up to the mic. Um, my fa Love of God is my favorite hymn, and the reason it is is because my daddy loved it. And he would, I mean, even things that we sang all the time, like that song, he would say, Okay, just think, just think, baby. If we with ink could fill the oceans, if the oceans were c totally full of ink, and we had scribes who could write, and they took every stalk on earth and filled it to make it. Um You're good.

SPEAKER_02 29:38

Okay. It's just I didn't plan for you to look at Jennifer and that. Yeah, you're good.

SPEAKER_01 29:43

Um and you would fill that stalk with ink that it would the the ocean, you would you would all the ink would be gone. And there would be no no more stalks left if you just wrote only about the love of God. And I remember as a child thinking, I mean, thinking that through, okay, if I was sitting by an ocean.

SPEAKER_00 30:11

Had you seen the ocean? Yes. Okay, so you knew.

SPEAKER_01 30:15

And I and it was filled with ink, and growing up in a farm community, stalk to me was wheat. And if I took all that wheat and somehow could put I mean, I like trying to think that through. It's and that's so like something my daddy would tell would talk to me about. And and he was, oh my gosh, he and my mother had the sweetest, sweetest relationship. Every year, the first snow, because we lived in the Pentham, we'd always get snow, but it didn't it didn't last long. He would he would come in and mother would be mother would have on a dress because it that was the time. She'd be fixing dinner.

SPEAKER_02 31:03

Every day. A dress.

SPEAKER_01 31:05

Yeah.

unknown 31:06

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 31:07

She would very occasionally wear pants, but I mean very occasionally.

SPEAKER_02 31:12

Makeup?

unknown 31:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:13

So every day she got dressed up.

SPEAKER_01 31:16

Yeah, did her hair every day, yeah. Wow. Well, because Gerald was coming home.

SPEAKER_02 31:20

Oh, right, right. Okay. Hey, I'm just saying.

SPEAKER_01 31:25

Oh, please. Please. And so he would he would sneak, he was a he was a sneaker. I mean, he could sneak really well. And she would know that it was coming, but not when. He would sneak in the back door. And she would be standing there cooking. And generally I was in there talking to her. And he would look at me and be like that. And he would walk up behind her, and his hands would be so cold. And he would run his hands up the back of her skirt. And she would squeal, Gerald Wilson. The first snow he would wake her up and roll her in it.

SPEAKER_02 32:08

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01 32:09

Oh my God.

SPEAKER_02 32:10

I mean, how fun.

SPEAKER_01 32:13

Absolutely the most delightful man.

SPEAKER_02 32:15

That's so fun.

SPEAKER_01 32:17

So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:18

And fun. Did you know that? Sounds like he was very childlike.

SPEAKER_01 32:21

Oh. He uh until I was probably ten or so, almost every single we didn't have a TV by choice. My parents didn't want a TV. So he would, he would, he would lay on the floor like this with his hands back. And he'd say, Come on. And I would stand in his hands. Oh wow. And he would lift me up. And I thought that he was, I mean, you know, some people could maybe say that Superman was strong or somebody, but I knew that I had the strongest daddy in the whole world. That's sweet. I love that. So yeah, he was a good daddy.

SPEAKER_00 33:03

So how old were you when he died?

SPEAKER_01 33:06

Uh well, he died in nineteen. Eighty-two.

SPEAKER_02 33:17

Did you glitch?

SPEAKER_01 33:21

I did. I totally glitched. I'm thinking, what? Okay, yeah, 1972. I I mean 1982. So I was like in my 30s, approaching 40. I I just, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:35

How old was Jessica when she died?

SPEAKER_01 33:38

50. She was 50. 50. Approach uh gonna be 50, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:43

Did your kids know your dad?

SPEAKER_01 33:45

Yes. Okay. Yes, they did. Yes, they did.

SPEAKER_02 33:50

Did the dad have the same thing?

unknown 33:52

Hmm?

SPEAKER_01 33:52

Did Jessica and your dad both Jessica had uh a a form of lymphoma?

SPEAKER_02 33:57

Lymphoma.

SPEAKER_01 33:58

She could never do anything like everybody else did. She had a kind of lymphona lymphoma that only Hispanic or Filipino men get.

SPEAKER_02 34:14

Meanwhile, Dan's like, uh, Diane?

SPEAKER_01 34:17

Yes, uh, what's going on? So, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:21

Wow. So you have two kids. Tell us about them because we're talking about Jessica and people don't know who Jessica is. Jessica, we had two children, Jessica and Joshua.

SPEAKER_01 34:32

Jessica um was diagnosed um with lymphoma. Until that point, she had been a terribly, extremely healthy person. She married Philip, who is aside from my daddy, and I Dan knows this, so it doesn't hurt his feelings. Aside from my daddy, Philip Moreland is the most fantastic man of the world. He really is. He really is.

SPEAKER_02 34:59

It's it is sickening. It's kind of crazy. When I met Philip, I was like, well, that stinks.

SPEAKER_00 35:07

Yeah, no bullying.

SPEAKER_04 35:08

No fooling.

SPEAKER_02 35:10

I was like, well, okay.

SPEAKER_01 35:11

Those guys exist. Dang it. Well, yeah, and almost every girl that I know that ever met him is like that. Well, crap, how did Jessica get him?

unknown 35:19

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 35:20

Because I started praying for him when she was in my womb. That's how. Wow. So um they had five children.

SPEAKER_02 35:30

Um are they all biological kids? No. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 35:33

Two adopted.

SPEAKER_02 35:34

Two adopted.

SPEAKER_01 35:35

Three biological. Um, and so they they were living in Franklin. And Philip came to us. Isaiah was baby baby at the time, her young their youngest. So he's future husband. Yes, so I'm sorry, he's already married.

SPEAKER_00 35:58

He's what?

SPEAKER_01 36:00

Yes, I know.

SPEAKER_00 36:01

Okay, I didn't know he got married. Okay, you can go. Well, that's not.

SPEAKER_02 36:04

Just kidding. I mean, do they have kids?

SPEAKER_00 36:06

Not yet. Well, finished a lot. He got married. He did. How dare he? I know. How old is he?

SPEAKER_01 36:15

He's 21. 22.

SPEAKER_00 36:18

See, they would have been well anyway.

Jessica’s Diagnosis, Purpose, And Trust

SPEAKER_01 36:19

All right. I know. Never mind. Well, there are several other women who take that same tack with me, and I just have to be nice to them. I don't know. Anyway. So, anyway, um, Philip came to us and said, we were living in South Nashville. And they were living out in Franklin. And Philip said, if we this is my son-in-law, not even my son. He said, if we found a place that all of us would fit in, would you and Dan want to live together with us?

SPEAKER_04 36:51

And I'm like, Yes. Maybe I think we could work that out.

SPEAKER_01 37:02

And it took us about a year or so to find our house that we lived in. And so when we moved in, Jessica was homeschooling her four older, and Isaiah was not quite two. And so he was, I am crazy to death about all my grandkids. They really they are how many do you have? I have 11.

SPEAKER_02 37:23

11.

SPEAKER_01 37:23

And I have one great grandchild.

SPEAKER_02 37:25

So your two kids produced 11 spawn.

unknown 37:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 37:29

I hope that happens for us.

SPEAKER_01 37:30

I hope so too. Yeah, it's it's a wonderful thing. It's a wonderful life. It is.

SPEAKER_02 37:34

I hope so.

SPEAKER_01 37:35

So um Isaiah and I have a special connection simply because I he was my running buddy. Jessica was doing school with all of her kids, and Isaiah and I were out to rule the world.

SPEAKER_02 37:54

Like jogging? No.

SPEAKER_01 37:57

Like running errands. Like running errands. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

I was like, I don't think I've ever seen you jog.

SPEAKER_01 38:02

No, you wouldn't have ever seen me jog. No, never. No, we just we just ran around. Everything, everything we did. I I mean, we went to the movies, I took him to plays. I mean, I and and I mean we have this thing at 22. When I talk to him, I will I I immediately say, I love you the most. And he'll say, Ah. Because whoever says it, I love you the most. Um, because I said it the first. We we do that all the time. I mean, and like I said, it the the kid is 22.

SPEAKER_04 38:39

I mean, I it's that's awesome. So sweet.

SPEAKER_01 38:42

He is he is a he is a precious, precious. He is Philip Jr. He really is so much like Philip.

SPEAKER_02 38:50

Is Josh older than Jess?

SPEAKER_01 38:52

No.

SPEAKER_02 38:52

Okay. He's three and a half years younger.

SPEAKER_01 38:55

Oh, okay. I couldn't remember who was older. So uh and their kids all are pretty they're all pretty wonderful. We have we have one and every family are gonna have one. So their oldest adopted boy is in federal prison in um Arizona.

SPEAKER_02 39:23

That's sad.

SPEAKER_01 39:24

It is.

SPEAKER_02 39:26

How long has he been in there?

SPEAKER_01 39:28

Two a little over two years, almost three years.

SPEAKER_02 39:32

So that was before Jessica died.

SPEAKER_01 39:35

Okay. Oh if you if somebody wanted me to explain my daughter, what she was like, this is what I would say about her if I was being serious. I mean, first of all, honestly, we could laugh at anything. We laughed at things that people should never laugh at. Oh, yeah. But if I were being serious about her, I would say this explains my daughter. Um Probably, I don't know, a month before she died, I was with her and she said to me, You know, mom, if this illness and my death brings my son Sam to Jesus, it's worth it.

SPEAKER_02 40:17

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01 40:18

Okay, so you look at that and then I think, how did I get this? I mean amazing.

SPEAKER_02 40:25

That is amazing.

SPEAKER_01 40:27

Amazing, amazing. So uh they move they they moved to um Idaho.

SPEAKER_02 40:37

That must have been while we were in California. I think it was. I think it was at the same time. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 40:42

Yeah. Um they they were on staff with um seeds ministry. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so they moved to um they moved to um Idaho. And then they came back, they were there for like two or three years and they moved back here.

SPEAKER_00 41:01

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 41:02

And they were only here for maybe, I don't know, maybe not even a year, I don't think. And they decided they left Seeds Ministry and decided that they were gonna Philip was looking for a position in a church and they found a position, a church in Wenatchee, Washington called him. And so they that's where they went. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 41:25

Where's Wenatchee?

SPEAKER_01 41:27

Way the heck away from anything in the whole wide world.

SPEAKER_00 41:30

Yeah. It's about near Franklin.

SPEAKER_01 41:33

No, it's about two or three hours from Seattle.

SPEAKER_00 41:37

Oh, jeez.

SPEAKER_01 41:38

Yeah. Um, and so uh the the whole thing of God being in control and all that. Um she got sick when they were there. And um because of health care cost and all that sort of thing, because of where they were, because they were in Washington, all of her health care was paid for.

unknown 42:06

Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_01 42:07

It would have never been paid for here. I mean, right. Philip would still be at the workhouse.

SPEAKER_00 42:12

Yeah. Paying it off. What year did she get diagnosed? Do you remember? That's a what because don't ask her that.

SPEAKER_02 42:20

It that's a we had the spinning wheel last time we asked her about a date. So it was not.

SPEAKER_00 42:25

Let me just this is why because you almost lost Dan to COVID, right?

SPEAKER_01 42:29

Yes, it was right. That was 2020, okay? Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:33

Dan had COVID and and because I remember we were in California and I'm hearing this, and I'm like, oh my gosh, we're gonna lose Bika. Yeah. Well, then you get through Bika, and I'm like, what the hell?

SPEAKER_01 42:44

She they were back here during that time. Okay. And then after that is when they moved to Washington state. It's after Dan. So he was out of the hospital in December of 2020. How close were we to losing Dan? Well, the doctor told me uh that I I just needed to be prepared because he gave him a a 75% chance of not making it until the next morning.

SPEAKER_02 43:16

What was that conversation like? Did you tell the doctor, oh, you don't know me?

SPEAKER_01 43:21

Well, it it it probably he was the doctor and I kind of had this dance that we did anyway. And um I just said, I understand, okay. First of all, I understand that you're telling me this because you have to. This is your training. I understand that.

SPEAKER_02 43:38

You told him this.

SPEAKER_01 43:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:40

Okay. Where were you?

SPEAKER_01 43:43

In the hospital.

SPEAKER_02 43:44

So you weren't with Dan because you couldn't be. No. So you're just in the waiting room.

SPEAKER_01 43:48

Yeah. I love it.

SPEAKER_02 43:49

And he tells you, yeah. And you tell him.

SPEAKER_01 43:52

And so I understand what you're saying. I understand what you're saying, and I understand why you're saying it. But this is what I have to tell you. First of all, um, my husband and I are are believers, and he's he does that.

SPEAKER_04 44:09

Yeah, I've heard.

Plan Vs Purpose: Theology In Real Life

SPEAKER_01 44:10

Yeah. And I said, um, and so see, we believe what the Bible says, and the Bible says that the number of Dan's days was written in a book before there was even one. So unless in the morning is the date that it was written in the book. No deal. And so I'm just telling you, not gonna happen.

SPEAKER_02 44:34

Well, what if you you didn't know about the book?

SPEAKER_00 44:36

What yeah, what if you were wrong about the days?

SPEAKER_02 44:40

I mean, did Jesus say, hey, I've looked at the book and this isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 44:44

No. What but what Jesus says is that the number of his days was written in a book. I don't know the number of those days. Neither, neither did Jokuyama doctor.

SPEAKER_00 44:53

Yes. So what you were saying.

SPEAKER_02 44:54

I'm guessing he was Asian.

SPEAKER_00 44:56

No, I didn't say so. What you were saying is if that isn't the day, if that wasn't the day, then it's not gonna happen.

SPEAKER_01 45:04

Exactly. Right. Okay. And you can't know that that's the day, obviously. Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 45:08

It's not like he said to you 75% chance that the book says this.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

The first thing I said after he said the 75% chance was, which I learned from my dad when my dad had leukemia and the doctor told him he had a 75% chance of dying. This was my daddy's response. Well, tell me if I'm wrong, but doesn't that mean that's a 25% chance that I'm good? Wow.

SPEAKER_02 45:31

Those are bet nods.

SPEAKER_01 45:33

So that's um that's what I told the doctor first. Okay, so I came home. We had wonderful friends, um, David and Martha Hageman. David is a pulmonary specialist and works at Vandy and had committed to Dan, if you get COVID, I'm gonna keep you alive. And and the I mean, wow, just you know, I mean, they're they're just fabulous people. And but every day when I left the hospital and drove home, David would call me or I would call him and he would read to me what Dan's chart said. Oh, wow, you had like an inside totally, oh, awesome. And he was so kind. I mean, I there were times when I knew that what he was reading, I knew he didn't lie to me, but I I knew that there were times when he was like, I don't really want to tell her this. But he would just, you know. So I told him that day on the way home, and and he said, He's he's really sick. And I said, I know, but I'm just telling you, I there is this thing that God does for his people, maybe for people that are not even his people, but there's this thing that he does where he gives you hope and truth and a piece of himself piece that there's no explanation for. And that's where I was living at that point. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 47:02

And do you think that if it was if the book said it is time, you'd have had a different piece.

SPEAKER_01 47:09

Yeah. I totally do.

SPEAKER_02 47:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:12

I totally do. So I got home, I called Jessica because she was my she was my go-to person for keeping everybody updated. Because I that was kill that was the hardest thing for me was to keep Facebook and all that going. And so I I called her and I said, okay, I need you, you need to send the word out now. We're gonna pray tonight. Nine o'clock. Everybody that we know, all across the world, Africa, Philippines, all the places that we know and love. I knew somebody in the Philippines. I did, yes.

SPEAKER_00 47:47

Some man. So I I don't know about this. Oh, because of the never mind, because of Jessica's thing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:55

Oh, for sure. That's right. We just didn't know it yet. So anyway, I just said, we're gonna we're gonna pray. We're gonna lift him up at nine o'clock my time, everywhere. We're just gonna pray and ask God to intervene. And so she said, I'm on it. And so that's what she did. I'm sitting on the floor by my footstool at nine o'clock, and my phone begins to ring. And it rang for over an hour. Nobody wanting to talk, people leaving me messages. I'm praying, I'm praying, I'm praying, I'm I'm praying. All of our friends in Africa. I mean, I I just can't even tell you. I it's unbelievable. I went to bed that night totally at peace, knowing that God was at work and that I could trust him, and that I could trust the people that loved me and that loved him, and that were presenting my case before him. So I got up, go to the hospital in the morning, the same time I always do. And the doctor's kind is waiting for me, so I come in and he says to me, kind of snippy, because he didn't know what to do with me. I mean, he really didn't.

SPEAKER_02 49:21

And so that's kind of why I asked, what was that like?

SPEAKER_01 49:25

Yeah. So I I walk in and he goes, Well, um, he's still with us, and I, like a six-year-old, looked at him and said, Told you. Oh. And that was a turning point in Dan's wellness.

SPEAKER_02 49:48

I mean, it never got worse than that.

SPEAKER_01 49:49

It never got worse than that.

SPEAKER_00 49:51

I remember hearing he was on a ventilator and being like, oh, crap. Because at the time it was like once you were. Absolutely. It was hard to come in. I was like, dang it. So I just remember, you know, getting the updates and being like, crap. But then hearing he came off the ventilator and being like, oh my word, Diane. And he prayed this man alive. That's right.

SPEAKER_02 50:14

You know, I just pictured Jesus coming to you and going, Okay, you have some persuasive friends.

SPEAKER_00 50:21

Yeah. Can you please tell them to quit calling?

SPEAKER_02 50:23

I didn't even know you knew this many people.

SPEAKER_01 50:28

I mean, it was just, I it was just it was it was dreadful, but it was also it was exciting. It was it was exciting to see the Lord God of the universe intervening um where he didn't have to. I mean, I and I needed that, and I didn't know how much I was gonna need that until my daughter was diagnosed.

SPEAKER_02 50:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:58

Then I had to walk through that.

SPEAKER_02 51:00

How long did she live after she was diagnosed?

SPEAKER_01 51:02

Uh 10 months.

SPEAKER_02 51:04

Okay, so at the beginning it wasn't she's gonna die from this.

SPEAKER_01 51:08

No, they they did pretty well. They didn't know. In fact, they won't rare.

SPEAKER_02 51:13

Was she hurting? Is that why she she was? Okay.

SPEAKER_01 51:17

Yes. It was uh she had a they did surgery, she had a a mass in her stomach in her intestines that was enormous, and she just never sh lymphoma is funky.

SPEAKER_02 51:33

So so she was hurting, and that's why she went to the doctor. What is yes? Okay.

SPEAKER_00 51:37

So lymphoma is is your lymph nodes it's it involves your lymph nodes and your lymph system. Okay, it goes throughout your system. And then leukemia is a blood cancer. Yes. Okay, so I was just trying to get that straight in my brain. Yeah. Okay.

Aging, Agency, And Telling The Truth

SPEAKER_01 51:50

So um, I mean, they and they did everything they could. They took her to to um I don't know. I don't well it doesn't really matter. Uh a big important hospital in Seattle that was like had some doctor there that was really knew this kind of treatment and and all that. And um even they said I I mean they really said she'll they told she and Philip, I think, that it she would have about 10 months. Oh my gosh. And I it was like ten months to the isn't that wild. It is.

SPEAKER_02 52:32

Did they b did they believe it or did they go, no, we're praying against it?

SPEAKER_01 52:37

No, I mean obviously they no, I think they believed it, but but it was just um I you know.

SPEAKER_02 52:46

How'd they tell you?

SPEAKER_01 52:48

They caught they did a um call, put all of us on it.

SPEAKER_02 52:54

But you knew she was going in for tests and No, I we really didn't.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

She had been here and they had gone back home and they were going to a retreat out on a lake for their church, and they were on their way with their best friends there, who she's a nurse. T is a nurse, and Jessica just continued this awful bellyache thing, and they got out there and T said, we're turning around and going back. And they went back into Wenatchee to the hospital. And and I mean, they knew shortly after that that it was you know, that this was it. And I I again, I mean, I I just grateful that I had what I had with Dan before Jessica got sick because I've always known that the Lord is gonna do what is the best. I mean, he says, but the thing he has taught me since then is I grew up a Southern Baptist girl. I mean, I knew the whole God has a purpose for your life. I mean, yeah, I mean, a plan for your life. God has a plan for your life. Every every Baptist kid knows that.

SPEAKER_00 54:17

That's absolutely and the lighting moon. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 54:21

Exactly. Um, but he taught me through that that not only does he have a plan, but he has a purpose, and that I could trust the purpose. I didn't have to like the purpose. I didn't have to try to figure out the purpose, but I needed to know for me that not that this was his plan, but that that the plan had there was a purpose to the plan. Otherwise, it's like, then why are you doing this? So what does that mean? What does the purpose mean? The purpose is it's not just a it's not just a willy-nilly plan that you're just kind of, you know, oh, you know, people get sick. That's just what happens. Oh fallen world. Yeah, exactly. You know, there's a car wreck, it just happens. There are evil people, blah, blah, blah. All those things are true. But those things are true because God has a purpose in using all of those things to make us what he wants us to be. So the purpose is holiness. Yes, eventually, yeah. And the purpose is trust for me. It's I have to trust that he knows what he's doing.

SPEAKER_02 55:32

Because I a little happiness thrown in there too. Yeah, yeah. Holiness, happiness.

SPEAKER_00 55:37

Yeah. Right. But anyway, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:42

What do you guys think about this? Uh uh this is fresh on my mind because I was having this conversation with one of my clients this morning, and she's she's been with me for we're probably two years in now, and she's she's great. And you know, this she's been walking through some hard stuff, and it's really changing her. And you know, she's she's asking the why question, which is always, you know, buckle up.

SPEAKER_00 56:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:12

Um but I told her this about myself, and I I think it has never been a comfort to me, the thought of God having a plan for my life. Never ever. Because it is a plan, I don't know why, but a plan for me seems so specific. And I have felt like, well, if there's a plan that God has mapped out, if for somehow I miss it, it's not his fault. But the purpose thing, like, I don't even care as much anymore if God even knows the future, because I know God will make beauty out of everything. And so whatever happens, I'm convinced that for those who are being called to that purpose, like leaning in, he's gonna do something amazing with it. That's way more a comfort to me than somebody going, Well, God has a plan for your life. You know, we have we have some good friends that lost their little boy, and I remember your your story about Jessica and your grandson reminded me of this, because he stood up at his little boy's funeral with his his little boy's blanket and said to an auditorium full of people I will let he was my best friend and I'll let him go with one of you, if it means that one of you tonight will give your heart to Jesus, and the doctors and nurses were there. I mean, this but, anyways, if I could never tell him, Well, God had a plan for this, but I feel like I could say, Hey man, you know God will work beauty out of this somehow. Like that I can almost like, okay. I can breathe with that. With the other, I just am like, the whole God has a plan for your life. I don't want to ever want to hear that song again. God has a plan. What if I miss it and then I am screwed, and then what will I mean then it's my fault. And so anyway.

SPEAKER_00 58:36

He was raised Methodist.

SPEAKER_02 58:39

I don't know the song.

SPEAKER_01 58:40

Did they learn that song? No. No, they don't know God.

SPEAKER_02 58:42

I learned it from her. I did. I learned it from you. All right.

SPEAKER_01 58:50

You okay?

SPEAKER_02 58:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 58:52

I I understand what you're saying, but and I love you with my whole heart, but I totally disagree. Oh, that's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 59:01

You disagree with me feeling comforted by no, I'm glad you felt comforted by that.

SPEAKER_01 59:06

No, but I completely disagree in the way you process that, because that is to me, that is the most comforting thing in the world.

SPEAKER_02 59:17

Yes.

Humor, Motherhood, And Irreverent Memories

SPEAKER_01 59:17

I get that he has a plan? Yes, and a purpose. Because otherwise, I totally get it's stinking random. Are you kidding me? What? Some Filipino guy? Seriously?

SPEAKER_02 59:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 59:32

You gave this to the wrong person. Yes, that was supposed to be what you were doing.

SPEAKER_02 59:36

Well, I don't think the purposes of the Lord will ever fail.

SPEAKER_01 59:39

Right.

SPEAKER_02 59:40

So the purpose part comforts me greatly.

SPEAKER_01 59:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 59:43

It's my involvement in the plan part that I just don't trust.

SPEAKER_01 59:48

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 59:48

Do you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 59:49

I I totally know what you mean.

SPEAKER_02 59:51

And and like, I mean, all of the mistakes I've made, sure, God works in that, but I don't think He wanted me to make them.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:01

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:02

Well, maybe that part I don't know. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:05

Um what I do know is that he as a mom, I'm I think Jennifer could I don't know, maybe you're not freaky like I am. I when my kids were growing up, I things would happen and I would respond or do whatever and I would think to myself, have I totally screwed them up? Oh my gosh. Yeah, I think that all the time. Anything that happens, it I it's if I had paid attention, if I had listened, if I had read, if I do you notice the the pronoun in that sentence is all I. And at some point, the Lord just reminded me that I am not, I'm not in charge. What a stinking thing to tell me. How dare you? Really? I am the mother. Yes, exactly. You gave me these children, and I I and I know what I'm doing. Oh well, no, I really don't, but I so I I just it is of huge comfort to me to know that I'm not I'm not gonna, I can't. He because I belong to him, I can't miss his plan. He will not allow me to.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:25

I okay. That I can I I see where you're coming from with that. I I can be okay with like I can find common ground with you on that if God's plans are more like a parent's plans. Like if our kids say, What are your plans for my life? I would say, Well, I have a lot of thoughts for your life. But specifically, you get to choose.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:52

But here's the stuff that I see in you, and I think what I'm talking about is like You're talking about a roadmap. I'm talking about this calling that we've all heard about. The I don't want to miss the center of God's perfect, like God's on a building somewhere, and we've got to find the correct route. That to me just doesn't that does not strengthen my faith. No, it feels like a trick.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:16

Absolutely. And that's man's idea of that whole plan.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:21

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:21

In my opinion, it's more thought. Yes. Because he is if he loves us in the way that I think he does, that would be like there being I there being a zoo break. And there are wild animals all out here where they shouldn't be, and that you just you put your children outside and you just say, now, just you know, if if any of them come up, we'll feed them or or whatever, and it's and it's gonna work out. That and God would never do that to us right because his love for us is so great that He He wants us, He wants us to recognize and and live in that love for us and trust. Because then it takes it off that takes it off of me. Yeah, that's what I mean.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:35

Well, I appreciate you explaining it. It helps me to hear you talk about it. I like old people. I just like having you in my house.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:44

You're saying she's old.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:46

I am.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:47

How do you feel about him saying that? Sorry. Well, you're okay with it?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:52

I I'm totally okay with it. I was I was I know you're talking about it. I was being facetious with you, but that helps me. I don't have that. I mean, my dad died when he was 68. Both my grandparents on my mom's side are gone, all my dad's side, and I'm like, I gotta it's a comfort to me. Yes. Her dad is gone, her mom is so busy. I've never seen someone as busy as my 76-year-old mother-in-law, 78-year-old mother-in-law.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:26

She has a store.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:28

And I you know my mom. I do. But I'm just like, you know, uh we're we're discovering so there are so many crazy things happening in the world.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:43

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:44

Crazy horrible things and crazy amazing things that I'm going. I I don't I'm worried that I'll be surprised by something that will like shake my faith because I was like, man, I didn't see that coming. But but if I can just trust God that He will take every bit of it, if they discover Bigfoot, that's not gonna wreck my faith. Because God has a purpose in that and God will work good from it, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:05:15

And he yes, and he already knew. There's not anything that's gonna happen that he didn't already know. I mean, I and to answer your question, no, I I am 79. I don't okay, when I go to the mall, which is not very often anymore, and I walk past a store and I glance over and I see myself in a mirror in a you know, the glass or something, I think, who is that old woman?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:42

Oh crap, that's me. Son of a biscuit. That's me, yes, exactly. I don't How does it feel aging? Aging is I'm like I'm getting older, my kids don't need me, you know, like they did. And it's kind of a weird I I mean, and I'm paying attention more to people who are aging, and I'm going, it's kind it's such an invisible there are there are things about it that are just really crummy. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:12

I mean, there are I I have arthritis, so getting up in the morning and having knees that speak to me.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:24

Are they kind?

Grief Up Close: Final Hours And Farewell

SPEAKER_01 1:06:25

No, it's not kind words. And I want to kind of have a hammer and hit them or something, you know. Right. Um but I there are things that I would I would not have known if I had died when I was 12. I mean I Right, right. And and I I think it's there are some things that are really important. I think it's really important to keep people around you that know you and that love you. I do people that I know that are struggling with age more often than not are or not, more often than not are people who have lost their friend base or whatever. And I've been reading a lot about um because of mine and Dan's age, I've been reading a lot about um nursing homes versus or not even so much nursing homes, but more like uh assisted living or places where old people live.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:40

Congregate all together as one.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:42

And and you know, we've been told for years that that's such a good thing. You need to do that because you know it keeps you around people and all that sort of thing. I am of the I I totally disagree with that. I I mean if you if you don't have any other choices, of course, but I it's been my experience that the people who stay in their own houses and kind of take care of themselves are the ones that do the best. I yeah, you know, I don't I and I I think I think we like I Dan and I look at things some things very differently. And I my whole thing is I it may take me longer to do something, but by golly, I'm gonna do it myself. Don't be trying to do it for me. Because I think the more you give up in working stuff out for yourself, the shorter your time is gonna be here, I think. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:49

Do you think when people get older they it is true that they lose their filter, or do they just become more of who they if a mean person grows old, are they just an old mean person? Or does the filter thing really true?

SPEAKER_01 1:09:07

Okay, I don't think the filter thing is true.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:09

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:10

Because I think we are responsible for what we say and think until we are in the ground.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:16

Um I I do think that one of my favorite things about oh I I grew up up around, like I said, I grew up around old people my whole life. One of the things I love the best is that A, you never know exactly what they're gonna say. But B, they tend to speak the truth. Now, I don't I don't think that means that if you're mean, you should keep being mean. I do think I think you see that in in people. And I don't think that's so much a filter as it is that it's just their life working itself out. I yeah. Um you might need to be thinking of that when you're 23 and when you're 48. And because mean people are just gonna be mean. I I don't want to be.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:09

Is there something to being in pain though, and just being like, I don't have time for your crap. Here's I'm laying it out. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:16

I I mean I do think that that's part of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:18

But you're in pain when you're still holding on to your filter. Well, sometimes, not always, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:25

Also, we are generally generationally living in the first time for in recorded human history where oldness is not revered.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:36

Oh, yeah. It's horrible.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:38

Like that's what I mean by all historic writings. The longer you live, the grayer your hair gets, the more respect you get. And I come from a Pennsylvania Dutch heritage, and that's very much alive in that. But I have noticed there's contempt for even our age. Yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:58

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:59

I mean, if I'm frustrated with something on my phone, I've had both one of my kids and one of my 30-year fr 30-year-old friends yank it out of my hand.

unknown 1:11:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:08

And do and you don't take somebody's phone.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:11

I mean, that's like it's like taking their cigarette. It is. It is.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:15

But I d I hate I hate that about our culture. Yes. It really bothers me.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:21

And I I think that that's as a result of that we have we have lost sight of the things that are important. I I I really do think that. I I just think I if I knew that I was really mean, I mean I think I would know. I would do what I could to fix that.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:51

Because I don't I don't want to be a mean person. I want okay, I want to be the kind of person that when they put me in a box or whatever, when I'm done here, that the people that stand around, not necessarily at the church, but I mean like at their at your house, and you have folks over and you're talking and my name comes up, then I want the conversation, first of all, I want people laughing out loud.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:27

You know, you You will have that. You will have that. Because you have you have a very unique gift in that you're funny, and I don't you're one of the few people I know that I don't feel like I can make you blush. Like I feel like I can say what I want, and you're not gonna be like, oh Jeremy, you know, like you're just you're easy. And that thank you, that is that's a gift.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:55

Thank you. I I I think that that's one of the things that I miss the most about Jessica.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:01

Was she like that?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:03

Oh my gosh. I mean, really, I still get cards from people that will say, I just something, something happened, and I was thinking about you and Jessica. Do you remember that time when we did blah blah blah? And I I became good friends with Jessica's high school friends. She hated me when I was in high school when she was in high school. I remember you talking about this. I mean, really, I she I used to say when we would, she and I used to do women's events together, and I would say, uh, Jessica hoped that I would die a slow and painful death that she could have a hand in. Oh. Because there were a few years that it was like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:48

And her friends, a good number of people that I am friends with on Facebook are people that she graduated with.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:59

Yeah, because you got to be friends with her friends. I did. And that really bothered her, didn't it?

SPEAKER_01 1:14:03

Greatly.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:05

It really You must have been the fun mom.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:07

It really pissed her off. Well, okay. I'll just give you one little thing. We we had a bay window in our house in Dallas. And um, my sew I set my sewing machine machine there because it was it was good light, so I'd sew there a lot. And on Friday and Saturday nights, all of her friends would come to our house when they were finished with their dates.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:31

Oh my gosh.

Holidays After Loss And New Joys

SPEAKER_01 1:14:32

And I made them call, they had to call their parents so their parents knew where they were. And I always had food, and we'd sit around and talk and just, you know. How awesome is that. And I would just, I would just try to shake them out of their comfort zone periodically. And so I there were a bunch of kids that were coming over, and I knew they were, and they were kind of parked in the in front of the house, in front of this bay window. And this is so bad. These are high school kids, and I mooned them. Boys too? Oh, yeah. Just because they had said some things that were sort of like dismissive, sort of like, well, yeah, we know, blah, blah, blah. And I'm thinking, really? You really think you know me? Maybe not so much.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:27

Why don't you take a look at my butt?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:28

Exactly. Let me show you my butt.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:31

I love, I love that. So there's gonna be fun some fun stories at your funeral.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:38

I mean, I'm not planning it or anything, but well, and and so I once Jessica kind of came around, I mean, really, we she and I found the same kinds of things hysterically funny. My mother, uh, it comes quite naturally because my my mother would laugh and all she had to do was laugh a little bit and she would wet her pants a little. We all know we all knew this about her.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:08

Yeah, my grandma did so.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:10

And I would pick her up when I hugged her and it would just shake out the bottom.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:14

Yes, exactly. Yes, exactly. Okay, so that that that was, you know, part of part of my mother's um part of what she did. And Jessica and I thought that that was hysterical. And so she would, you know, I don't it we would go places to go shopping, and she would, I don't know, she one time she she put in she put on some earrings and they were really heavy. And when she got her ears pierced, whoever pierced them, pierced them really close to the edge. So she put these earrings on, and when she did, it just like turned her ear wrong side out. I mean, really, it's the funniest thing I've ever seen in my whole life. And I I start hee healing. I mean, we're in a a nice store in Oklahoma City, a really nice store, and I am laughing like a loon, and I can't stop. And she's like, What's wrong? And I'm like, look at look at your ears. And she looks and she's like, Oh my gosh, you know, and and then starts trying to take them out, and she can't kind of get them hung. And I it was just it was just hysterical.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:21

Did you pee?

SPEAKER_01 1:17:22

No, she did. She peed all over the floor. Oh your mom?

SPEAKER_02 1:17:26

Yes, like her water broke.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:29

Yeah, if you would have thought so, yeah. And this place was called Johnny Brown's. It was a big, I mean, it was a big fancy place. And so I I just leave her. I just walk away and leave her, and she's kind of calling my name, and I'm like, and I walk away. And so in a little bit, I walk over there to see what she's doing, and there's a towel that is like kind of there, kind of soaking things up, and I'm like, what is going on? And she said, I mean, the floor was wet, and I just told them the floor was wet, and I'm like, oh mother. And so she went into the bathroom, took her pantyhose off, and turned on the hand, the hair, the hand dryer, and held them up. Oh, like hooked them on. Like come there, and so they're like blowing out this direction so that she could put them back on. I'm like, no, who are you?

SPEAKER_02 1:18:31

You cannot put my hose back on.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:33

And and she was appalled that I would not know, of course, any thinking, reasoning person would do such a thing. You have to have your hose on. Exactly, exactly, especially at that time of life. So, I mean, I and and so Jessica and I came by it naturally. And my mother was my mother was one of nine children. She had eight brothers, and she was the only girl. Oh my goodness. So, I mean, you know, the things that they did are scary.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:07

I could see us having a similar relationship with Sadie.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:13

Think so. I hope so.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:14

Well, I feel like you two already sort of do.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:17

I hope so.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:18

But I do know that both of our kids they equally they love our sense of humor. It's very much like yours, and we find really funny things about irreverent things. Yeah. But we've been told by both of them, like, hey, my friends are coming over, try not to be yourself.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:39

Or can you just go upstairs?

SPEAKER_02 1:19:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:42

Can you please just disappear?

SPEAKER_02 1:19:43

I mean, seriously, like within the last month, Sadie said something about Daddy, when you come, can you please not be inappropriate?

SPEAKER_00 1:19:51

Yeah, when they come over, you may yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:53

There are things you can't say in front of them, Daddy. Okay. I'll try. I mean, I don't know what's going on. Yeah, I don't know what specifically you're talking about, but I'll try not to say poop or penis or anything like that.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:08

Yes, exactly. You just never know though.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:11

So you guys always do Jennifer was at a cast party for one of her shows, and some of Sadie's guy friends are hanging around the kitchen. No, no, no. And somebody says something, and Jennifer goes, That's what she said. And just Sadie's guy friends are like, You're now my favorite person in the world.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:32

I didn't say to them. I said it to Sadie under my breath.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:35

Everybody heard it.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:36

No. She so we would go to your house for Christmas or Thanksgiving? Which one was it? Thanksgiving. Yeah, because we've got a thing. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That was so. Do you remember when Sadie took a microphone? Remember she was little? She would carry that real microphone with her everywhere?

SPEAKER_01 1:20:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:53

Anyway. I always knew that child was special.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:55

Special is a word for it.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:58

She's now decided she's dyslexic and that's why she doesn't read. Well, she's decided Well, you guys have both decided. Which feels a bit like a jet get out of jail free card now that she's graduating.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:14

Yeah. Well, whatever.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:18

So were you guys so Jessica stayed the rest of her life now in Washington? Mm-hmm. And you guys went up there and when she died.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:26

Okay. Philip called her.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:28

Did you guys talk about her coming back here for it, or was that like no?

SPEAKER_01 1:21:32

No, that was it no.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:35

She was I honestly, I just she she was back here for uh a week or so um in the last month of her life. But then she went she wanted to go back. When did she die? In um April. Three years ago.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:54

Okay, so this coming April will be three years. When does it get when for you did it did you start to let yourself enjoy stuff again?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:06

Not always, even now.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:08

Even now.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:11

It's but at first nothing tastes good, nothing No.

Church, Community, And What’s Next

SPEAKER_01 1:22:16

Uh n yeah. I because we had such a good relationship, I mean I I talk to her now. I have talked I have you seen her? I have talked to her since she died.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:32

Have you seen her too? Yeah. Was it wonderful?

SPEAKER_01 1:22:35

Yeah. Mostly. I don't see her very often anymore, but I do talk. I mean, I feel like I can Yeah. Like I I and there are things that happen and I just think to myself, okay, I I this still happens and it is freaky. Like um me getting a text from Jennifer and saying she wanted me to do this. And my first thought was, I have to call Jessica, she is gonna crack up and she's gonna say, Mom. And I mean, it's so real that it's like I I I'm picking my phone up.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:14

What would she say?

SPEAKER_01 1:23:15

Oh she would think it's a stereo, she would say, Watch your mouth. You can't you can't you can't be cussing.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:26

Does that get better when you're older? You don't want to cuss as much?

SPEAKER_01 1:23:29

I have not found that to be true at all.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:32

Okay. Because I'm hoping when I get old, my mind is just gonna be pure.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:36

No. Well, my maybe yours will be. That I don't that has not been my experience.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:41

Okay. What's your go-to word? I mean, you don't have to say it, but what's it start with?

SPEAKER_01 1:23:46

Starts with an S.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:47

That's mine too. It's the best.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:49

Yeah. There's nothing else that explains there are just some things that can only be explained by using that word.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:56

Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:57

I am also old enough to be appalled. I mean, I really I am appalled by the F word. When somebody uses that word, I am so we're not gonna go here because I recognize that it's a um it's a minefield, but I am I am so disappointed in the leadership of our country that using that word does not offend them.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:24

Yeah. I will only it's only appropriate for the worst kind of like I have had some clients who have had some god-awful things and it's only appropriate then.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:44

And they have gone, thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:47

Because no one else has been that honest.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:50

But you're right.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:51

But that that's about the only one.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:53

You like the S word.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:55

I do.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:55

Which Well, I mean, I was jackass for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:00

When we have a fight. So how do you go through holiday situation now?

SPEAKER_01 1:25:08

I mean This is this is gonna be my hardest. This is gonna be my hardest holiday. Why this one? Because, okay, first of all, the Christmas holiday is fraught with Oh, right, because everybody was married. Yes. Dan and I. My my dad's parents, my parents, Dan and I, Jessica and Philip, Josh and Abby, all of us were married on Christmas Eve. Right. This and Josh and Abby are gonna be gone. They're gonna be out of town. Right. This will be this will be the first anniversary that we have not celebrated with our kids.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:51

Ever.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:52

Ever. Yeah. Um, and so uh I kind of I I dread that. I um I've always I've always loved Christmas, but since Jessica died, it has not been, I I kind of dread it. I mean, we get through it and all that, and I and I don't want to take it away from anybody. I mean, like I said, we have a great grandson. He he's like two and a half. This is his for his first Christmas that he really kind of gets it. Right. And I would ne I would never want to take any of that away from him. Sure. But by the same token, I mean, I when I look at him, I see her, and I think to myself, how much she would uh adore him. Oh my gosh. She loved kids and babies like nobody's business.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:50

Your great is in her downline.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:52

It's her yes, it's it's uh Jessica's oldest daughters. Okay. Little boy.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:58

Oh my gosh, I remember her bouncing around your house. Oh, she's got a kid?

SPEAKER_01 1:27:05

And he uh he's biracio, he's biracial. And did she marry a black Kwanzaa? Kwanza. There you go. Back to Kwanzaa. Uh he is, oh my word, he is the cutest thing and is certain that the entire world is just waiting to see him and watch him perform. And he's probably right. I mean, oh, absolutely. I mean, like he'll get in the middle of the floor and there'll be some everybody and he will start doing his little dancey thing. And I'm I mean, really, he's he is just and she c okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:44

I'm convinced that black people are better at everything.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:47

Yeah, oh, beyond a shadow of a doubt.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:49

I think I think that whiteness might be a birth defect.

SPEAKER_01 1:27:54

I think you're right.

SPEAKER_02 1:27:55

I mean, I I've said for years you give a black person the chance to do anything, and they will be better at it.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:01

I agree with that.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:02

It's crazy. It is.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:04

He thinks that was the mark on Kane.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:06

I think Kane was white.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:08

He thinks that was the mark. You know, he could say that God made him have a mark. I said maybe he was white because how weird would that have been to see some white dude come along.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:17

Yeah. I mean, because it white skin does not look good. And it doesn't look like that. Compared to black skin.

Wrap-Up, Future Ideas, And Goodbyes

SPEAKER_01 1:28:23

And and the hair thing. I mean, really, I just I don't know. He this child, um, and Maddie is just working 90 to nothing to make sure. I mean, like, she goes to like little seminar things and all that to make sure that she can do his hair well and and all that. I because she he is so cute, you just want him to be look as cute as he can. And so, I mean, he there are these gifts that God gives us which bear out the the truth to me about that he has a purpose. Maddie and I have always been close because she was our first grandchild, and she and I have always been close. Uh, she made choices sometimes that I wasn't crazy about, like I made choices she's not crazy about, you know, and all that sort of thing. But we have always been, we've always been close. But the gift that the Lord gave me with Jessica's death is that this relationship with Maddie, she calls me almost every day, almost every morning. That's my first phone call. Tells me how bring up your cigarette. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:41

What are you doing, mama? Nothing.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:48

That's my CPAP. Exactly. But like she'll t uh his name is Sonny. And so I'll say, How did how did how's the night? How did Sonny sleep? And he knows, he knows this routine of ours. So like when she's on the phone, I can hear him in the background going, Gigi? Gigi. Gigi.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:16

That's so cute.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:18

But I the Lord has given me this relationship with her. She talks to me about things that she would talk to her mother about. Child rearing, her marriage. Just it's just it's just precious. And it fills a need for her, and it fills a need for me. It's just the s it really is, it's just the sweetest.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:44

I love that.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:46

So I yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:49

She's do you have any female grandkid offspring single in their early twenties?

SPEAKER_00 1:30:56

I don't.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:57

Well, we tried.

SPEAKER_02 1:30:58

Well, we tried.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:59

I tried to connect all of it.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:01

Well, I was more thinking for Hutch. He just wants to be married and be a dad. Yeah. I mean I know. I would say he's gonna be the best dad.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:08

Yeah, I agree with that.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:09

Oh, he is just so he's he is the kindest boy. Well, to most everyone else. Yeah. Well, I mean, he's kind to us. He's not nice. He's very northeastern to us.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:25

Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:27

So you say your language is Jessica died, not passed away, not went to be with the Lord.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:34

Okay, that whole business of passed away just drives me crazy. Passed away.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:40

Like on this, like on the highway.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:43

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:44

Or like you passed gas. I d it's it's just it does. It just because what she did was she died. However, she lives again.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:00

Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:00

It's not an ultimate death.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:02

Right. And so she died and got born at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:06

Yeah. I the reason I asked that at To her true self.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:09

To who to who she really is, who she was created to be.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:12

What is made to be. Yeah. I have right when I started doing this work full time, for whatever reason, I got I had two clients at the same time who lost 20 year olds. And they said died. They always just said that's that's when he died. And I was like, okay, I'm just just what I'm gonna say then.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:32

Because I never knew how to say it.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:33

Well, you don't. I mean, I I I think you a lot of times you don't. So you just say it the best you can because the fact of the matter is she did die. So okay, I'll tell you one more story about Jessica. We were in Wenatchee. They had a they had put a bed in the living room, which is where she was. We were all there. Um the night before sh the day before she died, all the kids are playing cards or board games. Hospice. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:33:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:12

Well, yeah, the hospice nurse was around, but all of our all the kids were there, and they were playing games and hollering and hooping, and uh which they all I mean, it was just that's exactly where they needed to be. She was no longer alert and aware. Okay. And so um when we went to bed that night, we pretty well knew that at some time, I mean, uh that her breathing had already changed and all that. So some of us went to bed, some of us didn't. I did, I went to bed for a little while, and Hannah came and woke me up and said, You need to come. Um, and so I came in there and we all gathered around her and prayed for and sang and all that sort of stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:04

Was she still alive?

SPEAKER_01 1:34:06

Yeah, okay. At that point she was, but we knew that it was very she's in between. Yeah. And so um she stopped breathing. Um they uh felt called hospice and told them that she had stopped breathing and that we wanted about an hour or so, and they said that would be fine. And so it was early in the morning, like by this time it's like maybe 6 30 or so. And so the the two men from the mortuary come. Okay, so first of all, they c they come in a van, kind of thing, you know. And so one of them is really kind of short and I don't know, kind of nondescript. The other one was tall and looked like what you would think a mortician would look like. I mean, really and truly, just kind of so they walk in the door, so like here's the front door, there's a couch here, and then here's her bed. So they walk in, Philip introduces himself and all that, and the the tall one says, uh, where is the body? And and I giggle. Because why was it funny? Well, because we're in a room, it's not a very big room, really. You're wondering where the body is. I mean, I I realize that it he was probably just being nice, but I mean, I wanted to go, uh are you unfamiliar with bodies? Here's the body, you know. So anyway, Philip says, you know, and all that sort of stuff. So they bring a gurney in, they put her on the gurney, and they start out to their van. Now, this house that Jessica and Philip lived in at this point had this um driveway that was like this. And so they were struggling to make sure that the gur that they had control of the gurney down and the their van thing is down at the bottom of the hill, which is fine. They get it, they get it right down there. And we're all they had a stoop. It wasn't a porch, just and so we're all we've all walked out there, we're all watching all of this. Okay, so they they get her, they get the gurney, they get it in the in the van thing, and they close it up. And it's at a dead end, so they have to like turn around and come out this way. Okay, so we're all, like I said, we're all still standing there.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:51

What what's the mood?

SPEAKER_01 1:36:54

Shock, I think.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:55

I really Nobody's making jokes at this point, like not yet.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:03

Okay, so they turn around and they're driving out, and I look I look at myself and I look at everybody else, and we're waving. All of you, yes, pretty much. And I I mean, really, it was just it was it briefly passed. We laughed about it later, but it was, I mean, I'm looking at us and I'm thinking, okay, these men are gonna go home tonight and they're gonna talk about this family. That waved at them, yes, as we took their mom and wife and daughter away. I mean, it's just it's just but it was so right. It was so that was so us. And I mean, she needed a she needed a farewell.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:00

Did they let your grandson that's in jail out to go see her? So he never did get to see her.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:07

No. He did they let him call. They did let him call he had like a 30-minute call with her, which was fr it was precious.

SPEAKER_03 1:38:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:16

And Dan was not there. Oh dear. And so Dan got to talk to her as well.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:24

He just couldn't travel.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:25

Right.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:26

Wow. So with a long goodbye like that, like obviously she talked to you guys about when uh when I'm gone. And yeah. What are those conversations like? Do do people stop, do they go, please don't talk like that?

SPEAKER_01 1:38:44

Or no, we did not. We did not. Anything she wanted to talk about, we wanted to talk about.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:50

So nobody because I have heard stories of people that just they're not gonna deny, deny, deny.

SPEAKER_00 1:38:55

We're not gonna believe it. No, I'm believing you're gonna be healed.

unknown 1:38:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:58

And oh, don't talk like that, honey. You're gonna get it, you know. That wasn't you guys.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:03

Well, sadly, you know, I mean, the fact of the matter is maybe they are gonna be healed, but there are things that just need to be said.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:09

I okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:10

And that people want to say.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:12

Yeah.

unknown 1:39:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:14

So yeah, that was that was basically that was basically it.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:20

Was Philip a puddle or was he?

SPEAKER_01 1:39:25

No.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:26

He had a big thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:27

As soon as they were yeah, as soon as they were gone, he had a circle up and we all prayed together. And then he said, Okay, everybody to find a bed, and everybody needs to lay down for a little while. Which is what we did.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:45

We all took a nap.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:47

Basically. I don't think any of us went to sleep, but yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:51

But that would be appropriate for after I die, wouldn't it?

unknown 1:39:55

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:56

Are you so mad at how he handled that? Well, you hoping He would fumble somewhere.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:01

No, no, no. I'm glad that he I'm just kidding. When when Sadie Clare, well, we were living in California, so Sadie Clare was really little. They did a Father's Day thing at church, and the kids had to write on a card what their daddy was good at. Napping was what she put on mine. My daddy is good at napping. That's my legacy, Diane. Rob Howard and I were having lunch the other day. And Rob Howard and I both have sort of the same relationship. Our kids are great. You know, it's like, but we were kind of like, what are they gonna say about us? And I looked at him and I said, I think my kids are gonna say, yeah, he was around. I think that's what they're gonna say. Yeah, he was around.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:45

I think you'll be surprised. Well, you won't know. So we'll be okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:49

That's true.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:50

We'll tell you.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:51

We'll let you know later.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:53

Tell me. Tell me when you guys get there. Actually, uh you'll probably outlive all of us.

SPEAKER_00 1:40:59

Knees and all.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:02

Knees and all.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:03

I'm so happy you were here today. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:05

Uh, this feels like it should be. You guys are great together.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:09

You two are great together. So great. Because she and I have talked. You guys haven't got to talk about either we have.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:15

The good thing is, since I've turned the podcast over to her, her guests have been really good. Yeah. Like my it's there's been like three shows. But they've been so good. You've got episodes up there. Um you've got to tell your Facebook network about this. Because neither her nor I are really active on social media right now. Okay. I'm I deleted my accounts. Because when I would go to the bathroom, I would just download it again. You know, and so I actually went in and was like, okay, I'm gonna make it hard to get on this.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:51

Okay, so what do I say?

SPEAKER_02 1:41:53

Well, I don't know. You just tell people you're gonna be on our podcast.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:55

If you want to, you know, you don't have to. No, I do. I want I I mean, like my friends who are not here. I do you know Patrice Chesbrough?

SPEAKER_00 1:42:07

That w was she at the funeral? Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:10

Okay, I would have known her husband is uh an architect, has an office on the square downtown. Oh, okay. Um anyway, she's my adult, probably best friend here, and they moved to Florida today. Oh, I'm sorry before Christmas. Yeah, what a terrible time to move. It was a dreadful thing for her to do to me. But anyway, I I wanna I sh I told her that I was gonna do this, and she was like, okay, tell me when it is because I have to watch it. Oh sweet.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:44

Well, you were when when she was thinking about who she was gonna have on, you were probably the first one of the first three people. She's like, I need to get Diane Pelpett.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:52

Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:54

I we talked about it that first week. Yeah, you're right, we did.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:58

I think we have, but I feel like you guys, but all of us have we have more to talk about. Like I feel like we need to do this again.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:05

Oh yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:06

I'm up for it.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:07

Because I mean we have so much history that we haven't really talked about. We do. I mean, we have church stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:15

Well, not only I remember sitting in your house when you guys had basically found out that you had mole in that house. I mean, I do I remember that sitting there with you guys in the big house or the rental? No, the big house.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:32

Yes. Oh.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:34

And just I mean, I I just I was just crushed and I it was it was so bad.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:43

Fun times. Fun times.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:45

Jennifer makes every house beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:47

She does. That's nuts.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:49

I I have stayed up. I did it again last night. I'm just like, I don't want to go to bed. It's too pretty in here. You know? Now, after Christmas, I'll be ready to yank all this stuff down immediately. Maybe Christmas night, but not me.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:04

It's got to be the middle of January.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:07

Yeah, I do like it up for a while. Or I did before.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:09

Are you still going to church? Well, I don't know if you've deconstructed or something.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:17

What exactly does that mean?

SPEAKER_02 1:44:18

It's so annoying, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 1:44:19

It is, it's annoying. Uh yes, we go to Stunbridge. They go what you know.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:24

You're what you know. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:26

It's got that church is crazy.

SPEAKER_02 1:44:28

It's gotten big.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:30

Yeah. I I really um I mean, we've been there since the beginning. Yeah, I figured. Uh, because we started Michael was teaching first or second Peter. Didn't even have a church, but they were meeting where we're meeting now. And Dan and I went because we love him. Yeah, he's wonderful. And so um then when they started the church, I mean, we were just there. So we've been there from the beginning. Um the the part it's a good it's a good thing, but a sad thing to me. Obviously, people are hungry for the word because otherwise you don't keep getting all this number of people coming to church. Excuse me, but now we have like four services, and I feel like I don't know right, yeah, hardly any of the people there. And I realize that I really kind of like that small church, small town feeling. Right.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:34

That's what we grew up in.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:35

Yeah, that's what Janelle kind of misses too about. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:38

I think there is a little bit of a a Franklin, Tennessee, because everybody here, for the most part, is a Christian, there's kind of a hive mind. People that they find the newest. When we were living in California, we heard a lot about Church of the City. Yeah. So that must have been it for a while. Conduit, I think, has going through that stone. You know, it's just this hive of people that sometimes I feel like why don't we just all meet together?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:06

Like, could we is there a place big enough that we could just all hang out?

SPEAKER_01 1:46:09

And yeah, but the problem with that is that then there's no personal thing. I mean, I so you know, I don't know. Anybody that kind of defeats the whole small church thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:20

It does. Yeah. It'd just be well way bigger church. You know, some of these churches, including Fellowship Bible, they they'll try to rent out a place and go, we're all gonna get together and have See, that's what we're doing for Christmas.

SPEAKER_01 1:46:32

We're not having a Christmas Eve service. We're having a Christmas Eve Eve.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:36

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:37

At the Ag Center. You know what? They're so smart to just do one though. Rather than Yes, it's true.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:42

But it it it feels kind of like a flex. Kind of like look how big are you?

SPEAKER_00 1:46:46

But the Ag Center? I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:48

Well, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:48

The Ag Center is kind of that's so cold in there.

SPEAKER_02 1:46:51

Yeah. Oh, they'll make it good.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:53

I'm sure they will, but anyway. It is nice though that you're not doing nine services, like you know. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:01

That's yeah. I think Philip has okay, he's pastoring at the Spring Hill Church. Which one? Community pastor, uh Church of the City. Oh he's the community pastor at that church. Oh wow.

SPEAKER_02 1:47:15

Their worship is so good.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:18

And then Gabe, the other adopted grandson, is um on staff at the Nolansville Church of the City. Oh, okay. Oh, fun. So they they're all busy. Yeah, we and we tease them about are you are you guys gonna start your own in the Moreland Church of the City? What uh what's going on here?

SPEAKER_02 1:47:43

I'd go to that one, probably. I mean, if Philip really is this, I mean, he hasn't failed us yet. It's he hasn't failed us yet. It's oh, and he's cute. Do you think that's a good one? I mean, I remember I remember when I met him, I thought, okay, he is this way, and he's funny, and he's cute. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:48:05

That's do you think he'll ever remarry?

SPEAKER_01 1:48:09

You know, I I don't know. I I would think Is he fifty?

SPEAKER_02 1:48:15

Fifty, okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:16

Yeah, I would think he doesn't I knowing his personality, I would think that he would. But I don't know that he will date to find somebody. I don't know. And several people have asked me, well, would that would that offend you or whatever? And I'm like I I don't remember who told me a friend of mine years ago who had lost her husband said the You know the marriages that are good when they remarry after a death. Because they've known what a good marriage is.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:03

Yeah, they're not going, I'm never getting married again. I just had it do you want to sign everybody off at the end of the day? We probably should. Yeah, it's too long. I you guys need to I don't know if this is from the Lord, but I think it is.

SPEAKER_03 1:49:16

Uh oh.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:16

Um you guys should do like an eight-part Bible study on here.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:23

Oh, that'd be cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:24

You do a Bible study together and just have people join you.

SPEAKER_01 1:49:28

Oh. I think that's something to pray about.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:31

I think it is too.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:32

Or we could even do it live.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:34

Well, no, if you did it, people could then download it.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:37

Right. There is that.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:38

I mean, you could stream it, I guess. That would be you guys should do that.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:43

That'd be awesome.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:44

And I don't need to be on it.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:46

Yes, you do. You have to produce it and wear those headphones.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:48

They are cute, aren't they? They are. You want to play producer tonight?

SPEAKER_01 1:49:53

Oh, lordy me. Let me get my car started. I don't want to be involved in this.

SPEAKER_00 1:49:59

All right. Thank you guys. Thank you so, so much. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:03

It's been a delight. You're two of my most favorite people.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:07

We feel the same about you.