Rest In Peace Art

When I was small, Art used to take my brother Frank and I camping and fishing. Rick would come along too, when he was in town. Art took such good care of us; he fed us Spam and eggs for breakfast and he kept us safe at night by snoring so loud that any bear within a five mile radius would be scared to come near our campground! He would also bait my fishing line, take the fish off the line for me and he would gut it too; Pretty much all I did was cast my line out and reel it in, but I sure loved it. He always made me feel like I was doing oh so much more.

One of my favorite stories about Art happened when I was about nineteen. He invited me to go to church with him one Sunday. Art was seated on my left and an older woman was seated on my right. We had just knelt down and I felt the woman collapse on me. As I tried to cradle her, I said “Art”…. “Arrrrt”. His head was down and he was deep in prayer. I finally nudged him hard and said “Art! This lady collapsed on me! What do I do?” That got his attention immediately. He held her and got the attention of the priest, while I ran to the back and called 911. The woman ended up being alright. Art always got a kick out of telling that story... He would say that he just couldn’t imagine why I wouldn’t let him pray in peace.

As I got older Art helped me out a lot with my house. He and my brother Frank came over to help me a few years ago. I couldn’t thank them enough. Art would always say, “We do whatever we can to help family out, right?” Of course I agreed. Last summer, I asked Frank to help me out with my sprinkler system and he recruited his dad to help me out too. When we got to work we told Art, “okay, just tell us what to do”. He wouldn’t though. He was out there, oxygen back pack and all, knelt down showing us how to cut the pipe and where to put it together. We couldn’t convince him to relax. He was just a hard worker and would not sit idle.

A couple of months ago I had the pleasure of taking Art to San Antonio for his first lung transplant consultation. I pushed him around the airport and we joked and laughed because he forgot to bring his foot rests, so he was holding his feet up in the air.. or at least trying to. He didn’t say too much on the flights, as it took a lot of his energy, but one thing he did say to me stuck. He said “Tonya, please don’t ever tell me good luck, because that is bad luck for me. And please never say goodbye because that means we might not see each other again, please when you leave say, see you later.”

So, Art… I love you and I’ll see you later.