Mark revisited

I was at a volunteer function for the Multi Housing Association Friday.
We were framing hundreds of pictures for the upcoming golf tournament next week.
There were a room full of people putting these things together and everyone was grabbing pictures out of piles on the desk. After about a half hour, nobody had grabbed ANY pictures out of the pile in front of me and I thought that was weird. Then I looked at the top picture. It was a picture of Mark and Andy Marchant at the golf tournament last year, both with big smiles leaning against the car that Andy's company was giving away for a hole in one. I told Mark last year to show up to the golf tournament to see old property manager friends even though he was still in the mortgage industry.
I was surprised and very happy he showed up and spent all day with us. Even though Andy, and a bunch of landscape salesmen were there to get leads for landscape jobs, all of us just stayed at the table and laughed with Mark the whole evening and never gave "landscape sales" another thought.
Then here's his picture sitting right in front of me a year later, missed by the other volunteers??

I thought about saving the photo for Erin, but I'm going to see if Andy or Chris happen to sit at the table with Mark's picture on it on August 13th. Chances are less than 300 to 1, but who knows! That would be really weird! I'm not telling Andy, but if he finds it, I'll take it out of the frame and scan it into the website!

Steve

Thoughts from Mary

From Mark’s Mother-in-law, Erin’s Mom, Vaughn’s Gran ….

I’d think about Mark every day even if I didn’t look at my beautiful kitchen floor, which he installed for Jim and me last fall. He did this without thought of payment (well, maybe a little lunch) just because he believed that you give your time and talent to family. It wasn’t an easy job but he never complained - at least to my face! Because I do see my floor, Marks’s face automatically appears in my mind and I talk to him about how much we miss him. I thank him for the love he gave Erin, and for being a funny, roughhouse, rambunctious dad to Vaughn. He put up with our goofy Christmas traditions and once I heard him laugh in spite of himself. Then, he began to participate by helping Erin make her Nah-Nah’s famous Swedish meatballs for Christmas Eve. He swept into our family easily and we will always love and remember him. As my eyes well up with tears writing this, it is testimony of the effect his brief stay has had on our lives. Thank you Mark for living long enough for us to love you and feel that love right back.


Mary