One of the highlights of my summer when I was growing up on the family farm (click here) was the yearly visit of my aunts, uncles, and cousins in August. It was a joyful time and provided some relief from all of the summer’s harvest work on the farm. My mother looked forward to these visits and she was very happy to cook all of the meals for her brother – my Uncle Truman F. Yoder – his wife Patsy, and their seven children as well as her own family. She was very close to her brother and gladly spent long hours in the kitchen just to please him.
I received a call from cousin Vince Yoder last Saturday night that Uncle Truman had died at the age of 93 in the early morning hours at the home of his daughter Janice in Sugarland, Texas. It brought back of flood of memories to the times when Truman and his family came to the family farm for our yearly Yoder family reunion. In his last 10 years, Truman was very frail but he always sent a birthday card and an anniversary card to Jeanette and me. Having lost his first wife to cancer, he knew first hand the despair and loneliness that besets a man when you lose a life partner, and he was genuinely happy for me that I had found Jeanette.
Vince said it right: “There’s a big reunion going on in heaven today – my mother, Uncle Truman, and his daughter Connie”. Let the party begin!
James R. Bupp