July 25, 2013 - Anniversary

Heidi Ross 9/2/80-7/25/98

15 years goes by in the blink of an eye.  That is how long it has been since my sister, Heidi, died of complications of lupus.  15 years.  Someone at the fair this week asked me how she was doing, to which I answered "Well.  She is not with us anymore."  The lady apologized and said that she had just forgotten and it just seemed like she should be there.... at the fair.  I would agree.  There are just a few places where the memory of my sister permeates.  The Putnam County Fair is one of those places for me.  There isn't an inch of that fairgrounds that she didn't walk on.  There are only a couple of the barns that didn't hold her animals. Nearly every project in the 4-H hall was one that she participated in at one time or another (we once freaked our mom out by signing up for something like 15 projects each one year).  We both had jobs at the fair in an ice cream stand and at Wilma Chadd's tenderloin stand.  She even won a prize at the fair the week after she died, as other 4-Hers showed her chickens for her.  The bidders at the auction made her meat pen of chickens the highest priced chickens anyone has ever heard of (all the money went to the Lupus Foundation).  Heidi loved the fair, and it loved her back.
Knowing that today would be a tough day for my parents, I called them and told them that they could grab my son from daycare whenever they wanted.  They took me up on the offer, so I also got to spend some time with them tonight and watch them love on their grandson.  It is still sinking in that I live pretty much around the corner.  I don't think that they are sick of us yet, and I am glad that I am going to be near for every July 25 from here on out.