Barbara J. Hamby

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A Final Salute

Yesterday my daughter and I said our final goodbyes to her father. She brought his ashes to Willamette National Cemetery, where I met her. She took care of the arrangements with a staff member at the cemetery while I waited. She had decided not to have a service there, since there had already been a lovely memorial service in her church.

She received the flag presented to her in honor of his service in the Army of Occupation in Germany at the end of World War II. She is his only surviving relative, as far as we know.

Her father and I divorced more than forty years ago. Among his things she found an application for security clearance he and I had filled out over fifty years ago, when he was rehired at Boeing in Seattle. It contained four pages of information about family and friends that I had long ago forgotten. It will be a treasure for my sister who is doing family genealogy.

On our way back from the cemetery we stopped for lunch. We were both sad that most of her father’s retirement years were spent in adult foster care because of alcohol damage to his brain.

His grave marker will have his vital statistics and her message, “I love you, Dad.”