Today we’re relaunching our special edition #gopurple #endalz shirts with long sleeve tees and hoodies for fall!
#GoRed for Stormy’s legacy
Each year, my sweet friend Weslea honors her dad’s legacy by fundraising for the American Heart Association in the Austin Heart Walk:
My dad, William “Stormy” Booth was 61 years old when he was taken from this world by a heart attack on September 9, 2009.
Weslea with her dad, “Stormy,” in 2007
A cowboy through and through, his greatest pleasure was working with horses, whether it was winning his All Around Champion rodeo title in 1965 or training a colt up “the right way.” However, his greatest joy was his family. His heart and soul were larger than life, and his love for his family was never ceasing.
Who was Stormy? He was a son, a best friend, a husband, a father, and one of the greatest cowboys we have ever known. The life of the party, a gifted storyteller, the strength of a giant.
There is a song performed by Trent Willmon that speaks to what I hope met my dad on the other side: “But I’ve heard it said that old cowboys don’t die. They get put out to pasture way up in the sky. So, if God’s got a Heaven for old cowboy legends, I hope the grass is greener on the other side. And he’s got good horses to ride… .”
I never wanted to be the grief girl but I lost my mom to Alzheimer’s. I’ve been a writer since I was 9 years old. In fourth grace language arts class, I soaked up sentence diagramming and essay structure like it was manna from heaven. Words and language became my currency, and crafting fictional short…
My mother needed us to love her until the end of Alzheimer’s disease. My grandmother took this photo of my mother, my husband, and me almost two decades ago. It was Thanksgiving Day, six months after my mother’s initial diagnosis with early onset Alzheimer’s disease. And it was seven years before the end of Alzheimer’s…
People who put up Christmas decorations before Halloween are not to be trusted. There is a season for spreading Yuletide cheer, and October is not it. Dates and seasons matter. There is an appointed time for everything. For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be…
I will never forget the moment I walked in to find my mother had taken her last breath. I stopped in my tracks on the nursing home’s linoleum floor, asking my father, who was right behind me, “Is she dead?” Slowly, I backed away, up against the wall across from her bed, as I stared…
My life changed forever, 36 years ago today, when my one and only sibling officially joined our family. At the time, I was quite disappointed that my baby brother was not a girl. I think my unimpressed look in the photo above says it all. I look a little happier in the next one: Today,…
A few weeks ago, I sat in a chilly, outdoor amphitheater in the Texas Hill Country with my awesome friend Lauren, listening to a few of our favorite Texas singer songwriters–Cory Morrow, Jack Ingram and Pat Green–play music and swap stories. While Rock the Red Kettle was a fun moms’ night out for us, the…
3 Comments
This is lovely and such a great cause.
My grandmother suffered from Alzheimer’s for almost a decade. It was heart-wrenching.
You’re awesome Lauren – tweeting this out for you. <3
xoxo
This is lovely and such a great cause.
My grandmother suffered from Alzheimer’s for almost a decade. It was heart-wrenching.
You’re awesome Lauren – tweeting this out for you. <3
xoxo
Thank you so much, Jennifer!