In memory
I have a lot of things to write about, but I told myself I wouldn't post anything until I had written about my grandma. Every time I've thought about it, though, any words I could say seemed too insignificant. I don't know that it is any different today, but I can't put it off forever.

Alice Pope passed away at 8:00 on April 25, 2009, after a short hospitalization. Just two weeks before, she was as active as ever, taking full care of my grandpa who suffered a stroke about 10 years ago.

When I was a kid, we went to Arkansas frequently on weekends and visited both sets of grandparents. I was still young when mom's parents died, but we continued to visit dad's parents regularly. Every summer, my sister and I would take turns spending a week at their lake house. It was always a special birthday present.

There are so many memories. In their first lake house, there was a stone firplace with grout that was the perfect width to be a road for Hotwheels cars. For as long as I remember, they had a pool table, and we played every time we visited. (I was fond of the poor black bear that was always under the table, too.) We would swim from their dock, go fishing, drive around the lake on their pontoon boat - always getting at least one sunburn each summer.

All of that changed when grandpa had his stroke. They sold their house and RV, and moved through several assisted living homes over the years. I had my own family, too, working and going to school and then moving a thousand miles away to Arizona... so we only visited for the occasional holiday.

I drove out to Oklahoma the day before she passed away, because her condition in the hospital was deteriorating. She was in a coma as a side effect of her sudden renal failure, and I had a gut feeling she would not make it through the weekend. I arrived at about 1 AM on Saturday. My mom offered to take me up to the hospital right then, but I was beat after the long drive and didn't want to be an inconvenience so I just crashed in bed. As I was getting dressed in the morning, we got the call. I still went to her bedside before the funeral home came, to see her one last time.

Below is the obituary from the Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise.

Following a brief illness, Alice Pope, 81, beloved wife and mother, passed away at Jane Phillips Hospital in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, April 25th. She was born in Farmington, Arkansas, to Hunter and Bonnie Broyles.  A proud Arkansawyer, she graduated with honors from the University of Arkansas at the age of 18 and began her long career in education.  Following WW II, she answered an ad seeking applicants to teach military personnel overseas and was assigned to a base in Japan where she met Alfred Ray Pope.  She and Ray were married in December of 1951.  Ray’s Air Force service took them to numerous stops in the US, including their favorite, Alaska.  When Ray retired, they moved back to the area of Rogers, Arkansas, where Alice continued to teach elementary math. When she retired, they continued to pursue their love of the outdoors and traveling in an RV, until Ray’s stroke in 2001.  From then on, she was his devoted caretaker.  To be closer to family, they moved to Tulsa, OK, and later to Bartlesville. She always said
she was a shy person, yet most would describe her as a “people person”.  She was warm and witty with a ready smile and she always made friends wherever
she went. She will be greatly missed by many.