As most of you know I moved almost a year ago, I can’t believe it has been almost a year. I digress, in my new home, the master bathroom has a bluetooth speaker built in the ceiling.
This morning, as I was getting dressed, I had my phone connected to the speaker. Of course it was full volume, honestly, is there any other way to listen to music? my entire life I have loved loud music, I have no other way of listening to music.
As the dulcet tones of the Bay City Rollers wafted out of my ceiling my I received a notification on my phone.
In order for me to tell you what the notification was I have to time travel a little so you will understand why it was so funny.
When I was a teenager I loved listening to my music at full volume, much to my parents chagrin. Well, my dad’s, my mom could just turn her hearing aids off and not hear the cacophony that was coming out of my bedroom. My dad was not that fortunate, after many, many times of telling me to turn it down he found a solution.
One day as I was lying across my bed, reading and listening to music, he walked in and handed me headphones. The kind that looks like Princess Leia hair, I looked at him, looked at the headphones and plugged them in and put them on. The look on my dad’s face was worth the deafness I incurred from that event. His eyes widened and he shook his head and walked away.
You see I had not turned the volume down, I had just plugged and played.
I would hear him later recounting that story and he would just say, with a mixture of horror and admiration, she didn’t even turn the volume down.
Fast forward to today, I went to look at the notification and it said your volume is too loud, you might want to think about turning it down.
I looked around and then looked at my phone and said you are not my dad and cannot tell me what to do.
I laughed harder than I should have at my own joke, but it brought a great memory to mind.
Come to think of it, I was probably listening to the Bay City Rollers when that happened with my dad.
I think everyone my age listens to music at full blast, maybe it is a generational thing, maybe it is just an Angie thing. We may never know.
I have been contemplating how to even form the words for this as it is incredibly painful.
On December 7th at 6:46 AM CST I received a text from my beloved cousin, Cindy. It was basically a goodbye text, she had been very sick for a long time. When I first glanced at the text, as I was driving to work, it read like she was already gone. I immediately started sobbing, I don’t even know how I made it to work, the hand of God was really there in that moment. As soon as I got there and threw my car into park I opened the message to read the whole thing, she was not gone yet, but it was definitely a goodbye text.
On my lunch I called her son, Justin, to ask what was going on. His mom was in the hospital and not doing well, it was her lungs. She had been having issues for years with her lungs.
I told him I would be up on Saturday to see her at the hospital and then told him to tell her she was my favorite cousin. He said his aunt Paula (Cindy’s only sister) was in the room with her, did I want him to take the phone in the room with him and put it on speaker phone so I could tell both at once. I said yes I do! Levity in the time of seriousness is a gift and I will die on that hill. So he took the phone in and I said Cindy is my favorite and Paula said that’s ok because I (Paula) was grandma’s favorite. Then we all laughed.
I went up on Saturday December 9th, to Oklahoma City, where Cindy was in ICU.
I got to hug her, hold her hand and tell her how much she had meant to me, as my cousin. I got to hug Paula, we call it the Testerman hug. Where you hug tight and give a squeeze. I also got to hug her brother Larry and his daughter Carrie and her daughter Kaylie. Hugging is good for the soul, especially the way we all hug.
I left after several hours and went home, I tried not to cry on the way home as I was not sure my car knew the way from OKC back to Garland, TX.
The next morning I went to my youngest son and his wife’s house to give the twins their birthday presents from Gigi. It was December 10th, my phone vibrated and it was a number I didn’t immediately know, it was Cindy’s daughter-in-law. Cindy went home that morning, she went home to be with our Lord and Savior and all of the ones that went before her. Her mom and dad, our grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles, I know without a doubt there was much rejoicing that day.
But for those of us left here, we grieve, hard, she was nothing short of amazing.
I am going to tell you a story that will show you the type of person my cousin Cindy was.
She and her husband moved to Owasso in 1985, that is where she and I reconnected after being apart for many years. A story for a different time.
At that time I was hugely pregnant with Jeffrey, I had told my husband, at the time, that I could not bring Jeffrey into the same house Michael had been in.
So we bought a new house, that had not been built yet, and this part is fuzzy, I don’t remember if we rented out the current house or sold it with us holding the note. Anyway, the people moved in before our house was finished and we had nowhere to live.
Jeff arranged for us to live with his business partner at the time and his wife until the house was finished. These were very literally the worst humans and I will stand by that to this day. I will not name names because they still live in Owasso.
Anyway, every day the wife insisted no one could be in the house without them being there. I was hugely pregnant and not working at the time so that meant I had to find somewhere else to be every day.
So, I went to Cindy and her husband Mark’s house every day starting at 8am. I would complain nonstop about these people and how awful they were. The entire time, I know she wanted to take her shoe off and hit me, but she didn’t.
On the fifth day when I got there at 8 she said before you sit down, Mark and I talked it over and we want you and Jeff to come stay with us until your house if finished. I said are you sure? Because I will be bringing a newborn here, she pointed to Amber and Justin (her children) and said yeah I’m used to kids.
I very quickly started waddling towards the door and she said where are going? I said are you kidding I’m going to get my stuff before you change your mind.
I got there right before the wife was leaving for work and told her she would have to wait we were moving out and I was getting our stuff.
She just stared in a dumbfounded way, then after Jeff got off work I met him at the other house and told him don’t even get out of your car, we are now living at Mark and Cindy’s.
I had the best time there, we talked, she cooked (she was an amazing cook, I was not about to get in her way) and laughed.
As long as I have lived, I never had one fight with Cindy, not even a cousin fight. If we ever disagreed with one another then we would agree to disagree and remained cousins, until the end.
I miss her every day, I miss talking to her for 4 hours at a time on the phone. Yes you read that right, our calls would last that long, without any lags in the conversation.
She loved fiercely, her children, grandchildren, brothers, her only sister, Paula, her nieces and nephews and all of her cousins.
Her legacy is one of love, acceptance and toughness when it was needed.
I know I will see her again one day, but it does not lessen the pain of today.
What does it mean when you get what you pray for? In my case it means a daughter, not just any daughter, but one of strong moral character. One who has a very clear definition of right and wrong, cut and dry, black and white. One who knows what she wants out of life and runs toward it full speed ahead.
I prayed for a beautiful dark haired, dark eyed daughter, one that had strength of character and yes, physical strength. One needs that to survive in this world.
Trust me when I tell you I received what I prayed for and then some. I could never imagine the woman she would grow up to be.
I love you so much Elizabeth Anne, I pray for you still. I pray you have peace and great joy in your life.
I want for you to always remember how much you were wanted, prayed for and loved. Before you were born, more so after. I am proud every single day to call you my daughter.
Happy Birthday Elizabeth Anne, I hope it is your best one yet,
January 13, 1934, a day that will be forever special in our family. Why you ask, and thank you for asking, I never tire of telling people about this day.
It is the day Foy and Odela got married, the day that started everything. I know I usually talk about how their love impacted me and our whole family but I was recently reminded that they had a larger impact.
I was contacted recently by someone in the Owasso community, I don’t know if I am supposed to say her name so I will not. However, those that grew up in Owasso and, more importantly, went to church at the First Freewill Baptist Church in Owasso will put two and two together.
The woman that contacted me was one of four sisters, my mom and dad LOVED this family and those girls. The girls would even sing in church, they were all 4 beautiful in soul, physically and had beautiful singing voices. One even sang at our mother’s funeral.
The woman sent me a message and reintroduced herself, of course I remembered her and her family. I had last seen her mother at our brother Jesse’s funeral.
She began by telling me how much our parents had meant to them through the years. How she told her children and her grandchildren about Grandma and Grandpa Testerman. Have I ever mentioned that everyone called them that? And that they loved it? They did, they earned it, by being kind, considerate, loving and welcoming.
I digress, she went on to ask if I would mind sharing some pictures of them with her, so she could show her children and grandchildren what they looked like.
I stared at the message for a minute, as it took me back to a place and time I love. I answered back of course I would not mind and asked if it would be ok if I did it in a little bit because at that moment I was busy taking down all of the Christmas decorations. If anyone knows me they know if I get distracted, and I easily do, the job will wait another week. She graciously said take your time. I did ask about her family, she told me how they were all doing and how her mother is doing. They lost their father a few years back.
After I finished with my task I sat down and sent her three photos. My mother’s favorite of them together, taken in the 1950’s, their last professional photo taken before my dad passed and lastly, my favorite photo of them.
The woman thanked me and went on to tell me how my mother encouraged her when she had her first baby. How their example of Christian love to this day influences her and her sisters.
She reminded me of how my parents, with their life example of putting Christ first, then each other, then family reached more than just their four children and grandchildren.
It was a profound moment and one that brought me to prayer and tears. The good tears, the ones where you are just thankful that you won the lottery with the parents you were given.
I will put their pictures here, the ones I sent and you can see for yourself how beautiful they were and how their legacy continues. I am also going to add one, of their 50th wedding anniversary with them and their children and children’s spouses. Mine at the time, I don’t feel right editing him out as he is part of that history.
I hope they are having the best celebration in heaven, that they are rejoicing and singing and having cake! I cannot imagine heaven without cake.
As you all know, or should by now, I am a huge Star Trek fan. I have been since I was 5 years old and saw the very first episode. I was transported to a different world, a different time, a future with immense possibilities.
Since then Star Trek has continued to never disappoint, with its many movies and spinoffs. New generations continue to discover the greatness that I have always known.
The newest incarnation, Strange New Worlds gives us amazing insight to beloved characters. A glimpse of their origins, we finally get the fully story of Captain Pike, we first heard of him in Star Trek the Original Series.
The Menagerie gave us all a small inkling of what came before. Before Captain Kirk, Spock, Uhura, Bones, Chekov, Sulu and even Nurse Chapel.
What formed the Enterprise we all know and love, what made Spock, well, Spock, the unrequited love Christine Chapel had for him. That just didn’t happen overnight, and now we know.
This series gives us the answers we never knew we needed. Anson Mount as Christopher Pike is a breath of much needed fresh air. We all know this series has an experation date and it does not skirt around that. It comes back to it time and again, we know what happens to him. If you are new to the Star Trek world please watch the Original series, you will love it.
This show is well written, well acted, well directed and the story lines honor our beloved series that started everything.
We have finished the second season of Strange New Worlds and it just keeps getting better and better.
I don’t want to give too much away, but there is a musical episode that rivals Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Once More with Feeling. So much so that I had to google if anyone from that world was in the writing room. No one that I can find so far, there is a throwaway line about bunnies. If you know, you know.
We see Spock as a science officer, not the captains number one, we see Uhura as a newly minted communications officer, we see Christine Chapel as the amazing nurse she always was.
The characters are as we love them but more nuanced, we get background information that we never knew we needed. But we did and we love it. We also get to see Number One, the one in the Menagerie, she is, of course, a move well rounded character than we first met.
When I say it is literally one of the best spinoffs of the Original, that is not hyperbole, that is fact.
Pike knows he has an expiration date, he know what will happen to him in the future and he is not trying to change his fate. Refreshing in a show that delves into time travel and changing the past and the future.
One of the best parts is directing each episode with my nephew, Todd. He has insights that I missed and sometimes I have to rewatch the episodes to see what he caught that I didn’t. Before you think he is young, he’s older than I am and retired military. He looks at the show with different eyes than I do and catches things I don’t and I hope vice versa.
I look forward to the writers and actors strike to be done as Season 3 has been given the green light.
Until then I urge you to watch, it is on Paramount +, the only reason I pay for the subscription is they have ALL of the Star Treks. Well worth the price of admission.
August 29, 1985, a day I will never forget, it is the day my heart began to heal. Rainbow baby was not a term used in those days but it is what you are. The day you were born was both terrifying and joyous, then they said you were born with water on your lungs.
Those 5 days when you were in the NICCU were excruciating, when the one doctor told me you would never be “normal” it was infuriating. I admit I may have had a few choice words for him.
You did grow up to have perfectly normal lungs, a few normal childhood illnesses but all in all perfectly, beautifully normal.
You were always funny and bright, of course an incredibly beautiful boy. Always saying the funniest things, to this day I don’t know where you got some of those things. Other things I know exactly where they came from. Your dad liked to tell you outrageous things and thought it was hysterical when you repeated them.
After we moved to Texas, I discovered Lord and Taylor and Neiman Marcus, important to the story, I promise. When you were three we were in Lord and Taylor, on the escalator, two older ladies were in front of us.
I was very pregnant with your sister, fingers swollen, so no wedding ring, you turned and looked at me and said, in your very loud 3 year old voice, “Why won’t you marry my dad???”
The two older women turned, with eyebrows raised, stared at me, as I turned beet red. I said honey your dad and I are married, mommy just can’t wear her ring because of swollen fingers.
Then the next words were well why won’t you let daddy have a girlfriend.
Needless to say we very quickly left without me spending any money.
You have always been quick witted and so smart, I’ve always been amazed at how your brain works.
There are so many memories I could go on about, Grandpa Reno giving you that first taste of candy.
Climbing to the top of the refrigerator, making your mothers heart literally stop.
Tying your brother up, (along with Daniel) and waiting for him to get himself out of it.
I hope your birthday is the best ever, you deserve all of the best. You were literally my gift from God, my Rainbow, even thought I didn’t know you were a Rainbow.
I am so proud of the man you have become, your beautiful family you created. Happy Birthday Son! I love you so much!
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, and I’ll say it in the future, the beginning of August is hard. The end of August is incredible.
Today, August 9, is my son Michael’s birthday, I still remember every moment of that day.
I was past due and the doctor decided to induce labor. At one point the pain was so intense and it was not a labor pain it was in my hips, it felt like he was sideways pushing outward. I told the doctor this and he said oh yeah if you get up and walk that pain will go away. I said great let’s do it, he said no you’re doing fine. I said what, he reiterated he did not want me to walk, I said fine, get me some Demerol, he said no, it was at this point my inner sailor came out.
I grabbed him by the tie and pulled him close and said if you do not get me some **&&^% pain killer you will not see one *&^%$%^&**&^%%% red cent. I then let go of his tie with a flourish and he angrily walked out of the door.
My husband at the time, Michael (and all of my children’s) father looked at me and said I didn’t even know you knew those words. I then turned my glare to him and he backed away slowly.
It was then the nurse walked in laughing with a needle and said honey I don’t know what you said to him but he is red faced and mad. I looked at her and said give me the meds.
Later, after intense labor, Michael’s heart rate dropped drastically and it was decided an emergency c-section was needed.
The cord was wrapped around his neck twice, he would not have survived a natural birth.
But he was there and crying and huge! He weighed in at 8 pounds and 10 1/2 ounces.
He was beautiful and perfect and my world was complete.
It was short lived, a mere 12 weeks later he was gone, SIDS, I don’t want to relive that day, it comes soon enough.
While he was here he brought so much joy, this birthday is particularly poignant, you see Michael has been reunited with the one he was named after. Michael Marino Barsi, he is now with his grandpa Reno, I find comfort in that.
Reno loved that little boy so much, he was his first grandson, that in itself made him special. They had a bond from the beginning, Reno could make Michael belly laugh at a young age I know he grieved Michael as much as we did.
I know that this heavenly birthday will be special, it will be a first with his grandpa Reno, perhaps my mom will bake her famous coconut cake. My dad, mom, brothers and Grandpa Reno will sing happy birthday. I can actually picture it and it is soothing.
Happy Birthday Michael, mommy misses you so much, every single day. I love you and know I will see you again one day.
July 12, 1991, it is a day that is etched in my memory. The day Thomas Alexander made his grand appearance.
The day was a hot, sunny, not a cloud in the sky kind of Texas day.
Normal for July in every way but one, my beautiful baby boy was joining the population that day.
Alex from the day you were born I loved you immeasurably, you added to our family in ways you cannot begin to imagine. Three is a magical number and you were number three.
You were perfection from the start, born with your dark hair, that turned blond like your brother before you, your dark eyes that had a hint of mischievousness, your infections smile. You completed us as a family unit, you were and are very much loved.
You were a happy, precocious baby and toddler, a curious child, always taking things apart. Eager to learn from the start, there is nothing you cannot accomplish.
I am so proud of you, I am proud of how much you have overcome to get to where you are.
A husband, a father, a business owner and an amazing son, you have a lot to be proud of.
I am thankful that when God was handing out souls He decided to hand yours to our family.
I hope you have an amazing birthday son, I hope your life is filled with laughter and love and wonder.
Just remember, taking time out of your busy schedule to enjoy the fruits of your labor is not a waste of resources or energy. It is a must, to reenergize and to rejuvenate so you can continue to grow and give all areas of your life the attention it deserves.
Today is a momentous day. It is my granddaughter Tessa’s birthday. Today she is sixteen.
So here are some of the things I have witnessed as she has grown up:
You have tremendous heart, I pray you never lose your capacity to love and to empathize with others, it is a God given gift.
You have an amazing imagination, I have had the privilege of watching that imagination grow and expand. I pray you continue to foster it and recognize the source from which it comes.
You are so intelligent, the way you look at the world and learn from your surroundings is truly a wonder. I pray you continue to learn from those around you. Be discerning in what and who you learn from.
You are beautiful, not only physically but internally, my mother, your great grandmother Odela Testerman, would always tell me that true beauty starts on the inside and works its way outward. Don’t be fooled by fleeting beauty in others.
You are an amazing young woman and I am so humbled that I have gotten a front row seat in watching your transformation.
Always remember where you came from and allow God to guide you in where you go.
Today is almost exactly what it was in 1989, the only difference is it started at 80 degrees and dropped drastically to below freezing and an ice storm.
How do I remember a specific date in 1989, let me tell you, it was the day Elizabeth Anne made her grand entrance into this world.
A daughter I had prayed for, a dark haired, dark eyed daughter, just like my Great-Aunt Linnie had been.
A daughter who has morals, integrity, sense of humor and strong.
I received that and so much more, so today, on your birthday Elizabeth Anne, I want you to know how much I love you and am proud of you.
You remind me so much of your Grandpa and Great Grandpa Testerman, with your love of animals and the way they love you in return.
You also remind me of your dad, your work ethic and foresight.
You have an ability to see beyond today and plan for tomorrow. The way you work towards a goal and you don’t stop until you have achieved it no matter the obstacles is incredible.
You are beautiful, smart, funny and caring, I pray you continue to nurture all of your God given abilities and talents. Most of all your capacity for love, please never lose that and foster that side of yourself.
I love the way you do not allow the past to dictate your future. You are an amazingly incredible woman and I am proud to call you my daughter.
Angie World 