The Sentencing (3/16/26)

This is the mugshot from when our fine,
upstanding citizen was picked up for burglary,
which then revealed his warrant for the accident.

If you've been following along from the beginning (there's a summary in the Plea Deal post), you know what an absolute cluster of fucks working with the State of Utah has been, so I don't know why I was surprised to find out that the dumbfuckery continued the morning of sentencing.

On January 5th, at the pre-trial hearing, when Mr. Graska (aka Sincere Deviolencia. Yes, I'm deadnaming him, and that's intentional) was offered and accepted the plea deal, we were told that the sentencing would occur in Moab, UT, because the courthouse in Monticello was under construction. No problem, we could find a place in Moab to stay. It was re-iterated a couple of times that the sentencing would be in Moab.

Come February, I decide to reach out to our victim's advocate to see if they had any agreements with hotels in Moab, noting that we didn't want to risk running into him. She let me know that they did not, and that our best bet would be to find an AirBnB if we wanted to be certain we wouldn't run into Mr. Graska. So that's what we did. I found one, sent it to Mom, and she booked it. It was perfect for housing the six of us for one night, and it was only about ten minutes from the courthouse.

Morning of the sentencing, we pack up and head out. We get to the courthouse and can't find the courtroom. We follow the signs upstairs to the District Courts, only to be told that the courtroom was downstairs. No problem. The six of us trudge back down the stairs, but don't see a courtroom. We go into a reception area to ask for directions to the judge's courtroom, only to be told that he's in Monticello.

Um, no.

We were clearly told, repeatedly, that the courthouse in Monticello was under constructions and that court would be held in Moab. I had confirmed with the victim's advocate when I was looking for lodging that the sentencing was going to be held in Moab.

At this point, it was seven minutes before court time, and Monticello is an hour south of Moab. There was no way we were going to be able to make it. The lovely ladies at the Moab courthouse were kind enough to offer a couple of solutions: 1) make room for us to log in and attend it remotely, or 2) call the judge and ask him to delay until we got there.

The clerks actually chose option two for us. They took my number, and said they'd call once they got ahold of the judge. We hustled back to the cars and headed south to Monticello. Just a couple of minutes after we got on the highway, the clerk called and let me know that the judge had a very full docket that day and that it wasn't a problem for him to push back the sentencing until we arrived.

I suppose this is the time to say that every person we've encountered throughout this journey has been amazing: kind, thoughtful, and helpful. Some of them (cough-cough-victim's advocate) just aren't very good at their jobs.

It was jolting to file into the courtroom and see Mr. Graska, just right there. Right in front of us. I don't know where else I expected him to be, but sitting in the pew a few rows ahead of us was not it. The judge allowed a few victim impact statements to be read, and allowed statements from each attorney. The defense attorney was clearly trying to argue for time served and wanted jail, rather than prison for his client. Also, the defense attorney said that it was only fair for us to hear what kind of person his client was and read a rambling statement about his client's life, pausing to choke up and cry at what he thought were key points, but mostly were just awkward. Mr. Graska was allowed to make a statement, which he did, but it was also just narcissistic drivel, and he wouldn't even turn to address us (the family). He managed to dredge up some tears, too, but I'm fairly certain that was just because he was feeling remorse about going to prison, not about what he did to our family. He'd shown zero remorse at all throughout this long process.

The judge didn't buy any of the theatrics and gave him the full sentence, after a brief lecture about how this wasn't an accident, but an inevitability for someone driving under the influence and distracted. Have I mentioned, I really like our judge?

Sadly, the full sentence is 5 years in Utah State Prison, 6 months in county jail to run concurrently. He'll be out in two. 

Did I also mention that sentencing happened to fall on Mom's 77th birthday? I guess, happy birthday Mom, your gift is that most of the court crap is over.

I want to share an impactful statement from Mrs. Deejo that resonated with everyone who heard it:

Bill was a force of nature: warm, steady, and deeply good.  His loss left a hole in our family that cannot be filled.  Life moves forward because it must, but it will never again be whole. 

Family Trip (3/15/26)

On Sunday, the Bionic Cowgirl, Nebalee, Junior, and I loaded up and headed to Moab to attend the sentencing for Daniel Graska. The weather was cold and snowy, but the trip went very smoothly. There's something to be said for having a brother who spent his career as a professional driver.

We arrived in Moab and checked into our Airbnb mid-afternoon. Nebalee and I had planned on taking a hike while we waited for Deejo and Mrs Deejo to join us in Moab. Mom and Junior opted to join us, and we set out on an adventure.

Initially, we wanted to hike in Arches National Park, but when we go there, the entrance line was an hour, so Nebalee found us an incredible hike outside of the park just a few minutes away.

Not being from Utah, and rarely hiking out there, I'd never heard of Grandstaff Canyon, but it was listed as one of the top seven or eight best hikes outside of the park. AllTrails had it listed as an "easy, flat" out and back trail of about five miles with only a 300 foot elevation gain. I know it might come as a surprise, but AllTrails lied. It was about five miles, yes, but I wouldn't have called it "flat". It wasn't overly difficult, but there were lots of water crossings and a few small scrambles, and the overall elevation gain was more than double the stated 300 feet.

Despite being lied to by AllTrails, it was an absolutely gorgeous hike that felt amazing after a full day in the car.

The beginning of the trail did start off well-groomed
and flat. Super easy.

So many water crossings, which I love!
I am breaking in some waterproof hiking boots for our trip
to Scotland in April, so I was thrilled to get to test them.

This is one of my favorite pictures from the hike.

I couldn't take a picture that does this landbridge justice.
It's an almost 300 foot span across an arch.

My amazing sister, Nebalee, with her summit pose.

Tired puppies for the first hike of the year,
still had to hike out.

My beautiful mother, the Bionic Cowgirl, 
at the end of the hike. Not bad for one day shy
of 77 years old.

The hike was just the distraction we needed, given the reason we had this road trip to Moab. It tired all of us out sufficiently that we were able to get some sleep prior to the sentencing.

Plea Deal

 

Beel and Ranger Danger

I've been dragging my feet on posting about the plea deal that Daniel Graska (a/k/a Sincere DeValencia) was offered and accepted. The virtual pre-trial hearing, when he was offered the deal, was on January 5th at 10:00 a.m. (1,141 days (3.13 years) since the accident).

We'd been joining in on all of the court proceedings via Webex since the whole thing started. The link to join had never changed, so at our prescribed time, we attempted to log in. Mom, from the Lodge; me from work. The Webex link that we've been using since the very first court date didn't work. We were texting back and forth frantically, and I finally went to the Utah state courts website and searched for the case that way. I was able to get in about four minutes late, but my audio wouldn't work. My coworker tried helping me to get my speaker to start working, but nothing happened. I could see that, for once, our case was first up and already underway, but I couldn't hear what was going on. I tried the "call me in" option for audio, only for my spam filter to block it without any way for me to recover the number. I watched, horrified, as that awful man answered the judge. I'm a terrible lip reader, so I started clicking around, looking for the closed captioning, and finally found the automated transcript.

Everything happened so quickly, that by the time I found the transcript and started taking screen shots so that Mom could see what was going on, it was over without representation from our family. 

Apparently, the courts used a different log-in for this court date, and no one had bothered to let us know. I was beyond livid. This was just one more way the Utah court system had failed us, and I wasn't shy about letting our victim's advocate know how I felt about it.

For a refresher on the original charges, go here.

They dropped the charge for almost killing Mom completely, and offered him this:

• Automobile Homicide. 3rd degree Felony; 0-5 years Utah State Penitentiary; $5,000 fine, plus 90% surcharge.
• Metabolite DUI. Class B Misdemeanor; 6 months jail; $100 fine, plus 90% surcharge.

That's it. 

Bill's death is worth $5,100 in fines according to Utah state law. Mom's injuries were insignificant enough in the eyes of the law for that charge to be dropped. As I said in my last post, we have a legal system, not a justice system.

I will say that the judge has been consistently good, and has taken no shit from Mr. Graska or his attorney. We do have the opportunity to influence the judge to give Mr. Graska the maximum sentence via our victim impact statements.

My anger with the court system is not because of the prosecutor or the judge, who are working as well as they can being handcuffed by the laws. My anger is due to the fact that it took so long for the investigation to be finished (590 days (1.62 years)), and the charges to be filed (725 days (1.99 years)). Add in the fact that we were never given the link to the pre-trail hearing, and I'm less than pleased with the Utah Court system. By the time he's sentenced on March 16th, it will have taken 1,211 days (3.32 years) to close this case.

The sentencing will be in person, and we will be present. Then, it'll be as over as it can be, and we can continue to go about rebuilding our lives without Beel.

New Year, Still Waiting for Justice

It's been six months or so since I posted the update for the court stuff regarding the accident that almost killed Mom, and did kill Bill.

The County Attorney spoke with Mom again on Tuesday, and delivered a gut-punch. They're really pushing for a plea deal. Currently, they want to drop the 3rd degree felony charge (for Mom's injuries) and decrease the 2nd degree felony (for Bill's death) to a 3rd degree felony in exchange for a guaranteed conviction for DUI and felony homicide. The plea deal would put him in prison for only two years. So, we're to disregard that he nearly killed Mom, and give him a "oops, we know it was a mistake" pass on killing Bill?

Mom can still push for trial, but the attorney warned us that if even one juror wants to throw out the drug charge, everything drops to a misdemeanors and he'll probably not do any jail time.

I think Mom's going to talk to the attorney about a counter, but we don't know what that'll look like. She has until Friday to get back with the attorney, but it's ultimately his decision. Pretrial is set for Monday, January 5th, so we will either have a plea deal or be headed to trial the last week of January.

The Accident and On-Going Legal BS

(Cross posted from Mom and Bill's blog)

If you'd like to get caught up on what was posted previously, the posts are here and here. As you'll read in the second post, I had intended to continue posting about the accident, but grief is dumb and I ran out of spoons to keep posting.

The accident was November 21, 2022 and we're just now getting around to seeing some action on the case. It took almost two years of hounding the Utah Highway Patrol and reaching out to the County Attorney to get some traction. Finally, on November 15th, 2024 (I wasn't kidding about it taking almost two years!), the County Attorney notified us that charges were being filed against the driver who hit Mom and Bill.

The initial charges were: automobile homicide, 2nd degree felony for Bill's death, and negligently operating a vehicle resulting in injury, 3rd degree felony for Mom's injuries. At some point, I'm unsure when, the charges were amended to:

• Negligently operating a vehicle resulting in death, 2nd degree felony (Bill)
• Negligently operating a vehicle resulting in serious bodily injury, 3rd degree felony (Mom)
• Driving under the influence - 1st offense in 10 years

The warrant was issued, which was a weight off our shoulders. It had been 725 days since the accident, and I'd basically given up. I figured the other driver got away with killing Bill and almost killing Mom and there was nothing to be done about it. I knew that the accident report was complete, which took until July 2, 2024 to finalize. But, knowing that the accident report was complete, I didn't see any reason why charges hadn't been filed. The evidence is pretty clear, in my eyes, that the other driver is at fault.

Honestly, it was rage at the injustice that forced me to "get mean" when I reached out the the County Attorneys in October, 2024. I wasn't sure which county would be handling the case, so I reached out to two adjoining counties and hounded them until I heard back. My relieve was short-lived at hearing that the other driver had been charged, and a warrant issued, because the other driver lives in Washington State. I knew they weren't going to go extradite him, that we'd have to wait until he was stopped for another traffic infringement. Then, his warrant would show in the system and he'd be arrested and sent back to Utah.

I (we, but I don't want to put words in anyone else's mouth) settled in for another long wait. I really thought it would be a traffic violation that would bring him in. Imagine my surprise when I got an email from the County Attorney on a Sunday night (March 2, 2025) that the other driver was in custody. But not for a traffic violation, because he'd been caught breaking and entering. For some reason, it never crossed my mind that he was a career criminal. It didn't matter how he was brought into custody, just that he was.

Since his first court appearance in March of this year, it has been nothing but hurry up and wait. We've had several virtual court dates. Most have resulted in an extension while he was searching for an attorney to represent him - he makes too much money for a public defender. He finally found an attorney, and we played hurry up and wait again while his attorney got caught up on the case. We were supposed to finally have an arraignment a week or so ago, but he got yet another extension while his attorney gathered the "factual evidence" of the case. I don't know, I think the objective toxicology report, the information pulled from each of the cars computers, and the reconstruction of the accident are pretty factual, but I know it's his attorney's job to question everything.

The one thing the other driver's attorney and I agree on is that this should not have taken over two years to get to this point. This case should be over and done by now.

We had a meeting with the County Attorney, and we were told that while he'll take our feelings into consideration, we really have no say in whether or not he offers a plea deal (drop to 3rd degree felony for Bill's death, 0-5 years prison) or goes to trial. He wants to offer the plea, we want to go to trial (2nd degree felony for Bill's death is 15 years to life).  He agreed to consult with a toxicologist regarding the levels of meth in the other driver's system and how fast it metabolizes, then make the determination if he can prove the other driver was impaired. If he can solidly prove the other driver was impaired, then he's more willing to pursue a trial.

He'll let us know his decision before the next arraignment date in August. I'm not hopeful for a trial, I suspect we're going to have to make peace with a plea. But ... I might be able to swallow the injustice of the plea as long as the other two charges aren't altered.

Logically, I get it. He has a huge case load, and needs to close them. But my sense of right and wrong is outraged.

A friend of mine is fond of saying, "We don't have a justice system, we have a legal system." He's absolutely correct. There will be no justice, no matter how this turns out. So, we'll play within the legal system and pray that he faces some consequences.

The Next Day

When Nebalee had called Deejo and Mrs. Deejo to let them know what happened they insisted on driving up from Phoenix to join us. Junior wanted to come out to Grand Junction, too, but Mom was adamant about him NOT coming. He'd just started a new job and she didn't want to put it in jeopardy. I know that was super hard on Junior; the four of us sibs have always drawn strength from each other and being purposely left out had to sting.

The work started the morning after the accident. Deejo and Mrs. Deejo had arrived a couple of hours after Nebalee and I called it a night. Bill was in Salt Lake City at the Medical Examiner's office, Reba was in Monticello, Utah, and Mom was in Grand Junction, Colorado. Lots of coordinating began very early. Nebalee and I peeked in on Mom, then handed her off to Deejo and Mrs. Deejo so we could head down to Monticello to get what we could out of the car.

Sgt. Taylor had arranged a ride for Reba to see their K-9 vet in Moab, which was incredibly kind of him. During the drive from Grand Junction to Monticello, Nebalee and I took on the onerous task of calling people to notify them of the accident. While Nebalee drove, I dug through our phones to find family members' numbers; those who we didn't have a direct phone number for, we sent FB messages asking them to call us ASAP. The almost three hour drive was perhaps one of the most difficult times of our lives. We hadn't even had time to process our own loss, but still had to make a ton of phone calls and ended up feeling like we were consoling everyone else.

We learned from when a friend of our died a few years ago, that we had to explicitly tell people not to post to social media until we had a chance to notify everyone and publish an official statement from the Lodge. We weren't trying to hide anything, but there were people we needed to speak to prior to it getting out to the general public.

I got a second call from Sgt. Taylor to let us know that Reba's ride had fallen through, and that we'd have to take her to the vet ourselves. Luckily, Moab is right between Monticello and Grand Junction, so it would work out just fine.

We managed to get everyone notified on our way to Monticello, and it was a huge weight off our shoulders to have that task done. Now we could focus on other things. Mom had asked us to get some specific things from their car, and Sgt. Taylor agreed to give us access to the car. Prior to taking us to the impound lot, he sat us down and told us what to expect and that it could be very traumatic. I believe he even offered to have another trooper get everything out so we wouldn't have to see the car. Both of us felt we needed to see the car and try to follow Mom's wishes.

The car was in pretty bad shape, but one glance inside at the driver's seat made me feel much better. I've been on my share of accident scenes and my imagination had gone wild. I've seen some really horrific ways for people to die in car accidents and had steeled myself for the worst. The two or three drops of blood I saw on Bill's airbag were a relief - it meant that he'd been killed instantly. He hadn't suffered for any period of time. Sure enough, the Medical Examiner's report that we received a few weeks later, confirmed that he'd died of an atlanto-occipital dislocation (often called an internal decapitation). My heart immediately broke for the bystanders who had performed CPR on him until the ambulance arrived - they didn't stand a chance.

This looks worse than it was, because all of the scattered pieces of the car were just shoved in it to load on the tow truck.

The entire back seat and everything in the rear of the vehicle ended up pressed up against the front passenger compartment. If Reba had been seat belted in, or had been in a kennel, she would have been killed; instead, she was thrown free. 

Though I was disappointed when Reba's ride to the vet fell through, it turned out for the best. Nebalee and I were able to see her with our own eyes to take a report back to Mom. I think it was also good for Reba to see people who were familiar to her. 

Rebs was definitely struggling a bit. Any of you who have met her at the Lodge know she's a sweet, loving dog, so when Sgt. Taylor asked if my parents' dog liked us, I was surprised. Apparently, she did not like the morning trooper and snapped at him. I didn't know Rebs was capable of snapping at a human. It must have been a bit more than just a simple snap, because the looks on everyone's faces when we opened the kennel and urged her out was incredulous. I just picked her up and carried her to the car with her face next to mine. 

It didn't take an x-ray to see that she had definitely broken her "wrist".

On the way from Monticello to Moab, I consciously watched the road near where the accident occurred to see if I could piece together any more information from the accident. Here's what I saw: there were zero skid marks from the car that hit them, meaning they never hit their brakes. There were marks from when they hit and launched Mom and Bill into the air, and marks from when they landed, before rolling on the diagonal. Thomas figures that if Mom and Bill were traveling at 70 mph, the car that hit them had to have been doing over 100 mph for that kind of impact. Of course, we still don't have the official accident report, over a year later. <angry face>

I don't know how we managed to find "her" blanket, but she was thankful to have it.

After splinting.

The vet in Moab was nice enough to keep her overnight for us, until we could figure out how to get her home. She suggested that we amputate Reba's leg, as the break was bad enough she wasn't sure it would ever heal. We were in no place to make that decision on Mom's behalf, so the vet agreed to just splint the leg so we could get her to her own vet.

So much was going on that day, that some events are crystal clear and some are jumbled. I clearly remember the trip to Monticello and back, but couldn't tell you a thing about what happened after we got back to Grand Junction. I believe Mom was moved out of ICU and into med/surg within 48 hours of being admitted. Her list of injuries miraculously shortened, enough that I began to wonder if they switched her imaging with someone else. The mandibular fracture they told us about didn't show up on subsequent x-rays. The brain bleed turned out to not be as big a deal as they originally thought. The flail chest (two or more ribs broken in two or more places) still existed, but the pain from that was mostly eclipsed by the pain in the rest of her body.

Mom kept telling people that they "re-inflated" her lung in the field, but I think we sibs were the only ones who truly understood that it was done by bystanders, not by the flight medics. It wasn't until she talked to the respiratory therapist on the day of her release that someone showed an interest in it and asked to see the puncture wound. I got the distinct feeling that the medical staff thought her memories were jumbled.

People really rallied around us, offering to help in any way possible: 

• A friend of mine with contacts with the Utah Highway Patrol got me in touch with one of Mom's human "angels".
• We had many kind offers from friends to help care for/transport Reba home.
• Mom's friends took on the job of calling and cancelling any upcoming reservations for the Lodge.
• Nebalee's best friend's family took care of us from afar, sending food straight to the hospital room to make sure we were eating.
• One of my blog buddies helped us find a Utah attorney with whom he'd worked on other claims.
• Every. Single. Person we were in contact with throughout the entire ordeal was amazingly kind and generous, not just the hospital staff, but also the hotel staff and waiters at restaurants. Through this horrible period of time, we were surrounded by kindness. (Except for Mom's car insurance - dealing with them became Deejo's job and he did not hesitate to tell them that he most definitely did not feel like he was in "good hands".)

As anyone would, I really struggled with the "why" of Bill's death. Mom confided in us that Bill was convinced he had cancer and had scheduled an appointment with our family NP to follow up just a couple of days after their return from Arizona. I had my "why" answered and felt immediate peace with Bill's death. That's not to say I was okay with losing him, after all, we all expected to have him around for at least another ten years. But after hearing about his cancer fears, it explained why he'd been slowly withdrawing from us for the months prior to the accident. I thought it was just me, but Nebalee mentioned feeling the same way.

365 Days

365 days ago I had gotten home from work and was in the midst of cutting pomegranates to remove the seeds when the phone rang. I glanced at it, but my hands were covered in sticky, red pomegranate juice. It was a number from Grand Junction, but not one I recognized. I decided that if it was important, they'd leave a message and went back to working on seeding my pomegranates. A voicemail popped up, and so I decided to quickly finish what I was doing and listen to the voicemail.

I don't remember the person's name who left the message, but she did mention that she had my mother in the emergency room at the hospital. I ruefully shook my head and wondered what Mom did this time. As far as I knew, she wasn't near any horses for another bionic-installation. I called back, ready to talk to Mom and laugh about whatever catastrophe had befallen her. It never occurred to me to wonder why Bill hadn't been the one to call - he's usually the one to keep us up-to-date on Mom's shenanigans.

I knew that Mom and Bill were on their way back from visiting Deejo in Phoenix, and expected them home that day, but didn't think much about it. They're experienced road trippers and had made the trip multiple times.

When I reached the nurse, she was very nice when she told me that my parents had been in a car accident and that she had Mom with her. Car accident? They happened all the time, surely it was just a fender bender and Mom was just letting me know that their trip home would be delayed. As the nurse continued talking, I realized that this wasn't a simple fender bender. This was a real-deal bad accident. She listed Mom's injuries: brain bleed, collapsed lung, flail chest, fractured mandible . . . the list went on and on. I don't panic, but I was definitely concerned and getting more so as she listed Mom's injuries. I figured when she was done, she'd move on to Bill's injuries. Instead, she said that Mom wanted to talk to me. I sighed a breath of relief - Mom's list of injuries was significant, but she was still with it enough to want to talk.

I tried to lighten the mood a bit when she handed over the phone, I don't remember what kind of joke I cracked, probably something about Mom being bionic enough, that she didn't need more. Her first words were, "Honey, we lost Bill."

I couldn't breathe. I must have made some sort of noise, because Jay looked up from his place on the couch and asked what was wrong.

Mom continued, "we were outside of Moab and a car ran right through us and threw us into the ditch. We rolled a couple of times. I must have lost consciousness because I came to when some bystanders were trying to pull me out of the car."

I mouthed to Jay that Bill had been killed in a car accident, and my mind immediately went into problem-solving mode. Mom said some more things, but my brain was stuck on 'we lost Bill'. I asked her if she wanted me to tell my sibs, and told her I was going to throw some clothes in a bag, grab Nebalee, and be there as fast as we could.

I completely forgot that I was supposed to be taking care of L.E.'s critters while she was on vacation to see her kids. I completely forgot that I was supposed to be at work the next morning. The only thing that mattered was getting to Mom as fast as I could. I called Nebalee, told her what happened and let her know I'd be there shortly to pick her up. There was never a question as to whether or not she was going with me.

Luckily, Jay said he'd take over critter duty, and I stopped long enough to text my supervisor that I'd be gone the rest of the week. Nebalee made the calls to the boys (Deejo and Junior) and let her kids know while I drove to her house. After I got there, she drove while I notified my kids. All I could think of was that when our Grandpa Ed died, Mom and Bill had the decency to come pick us up from school and tell us in person, while I was shirking that duty. I had to break my kids' hearts over the phone and couldn't be with them, but I needed to get to Mom.

I have amazing kids who completely understood, even though it sucked all around that we couldn't be together.

As we were traveling along I-70 to Grand Junction, I got a call from Sgt. Charlie Taylor from the Utah Highway Patrol. He'd been the responding trooper and was calling to offer his condolences. He wanted to make sure we knew that Reba had been found and that she was okay other than a broken leg. Honestly, I'd just assumed an accident bad enough to kill Bill had also killed Reba, and hadn't wanted to ask Mom about her. He said that he had Reba with him at the office and that she could stay overnight until we had a chance to see Mom. 

By the time we arrived at the hospital, Mom had been moved to ICU. It was a shock to see her lying in a bed, with a too-big cervical collar on. But if you've ever met our Mom, you know she's a force of nature. She might have had a list of injuries as long as my arm, and was black and blue, but she still looked like the force of nature she is. I could breathe when I saw her - I knew we weren't going to lose her too.

She was able to tell us what happened, and in the midst of this tragedy, there were a lot of "God things" happening. They were driving on Highway 191 just north of Wilson's Arch outside of Moab in the middle of a bright, sunny day. There weren't any other cars on the road, and Bill was doing about 70. I think Mom was reading, but she heard Bill say, "oh shit", and saw a black blur out of the corner of her eye, then they were hit on the driver's side rear fender. Their car was literally launched into the air, and when they landed, a tire caught on the soft shoulder and they flipped on the diagonal a couple of times.

The aftermath

Mom said she must have lost consciousness, because she came to as people were dragging her from the car. She knew she was hurt badly and thought she'd collapsed a lung. She consciously worked to control her breathing and fight away the panic. Lucky for her, two paramedics had been the ones to stop to help. One had recently retired from another state, and the other was off-duty. The recently retired paramedic managed to find cell service (it's notoriously bad in that area) and request a helicopter for Mom.

Mom being worked on by the paramedics,
after being saved by her human angels.

At this point, she knew Bill was gone. I'm certain she knew the exact moment he died. No one told her, but she did see bystanders pull him out of the car and begin CPR. Her breathing was getting harder, and the paramedics consulted between them. The off-duty one had the equipment and knowledge to perform a needle decompression right there in the field. I credit the two of them with saving Mom's life. The helicopter was twenty minutes out, and I can't imagine the horror of slowly losing the ability to breathe over that time frame.

When the helicopter landed, they immediately loaded her and off she went, without the chance to tell Bill goodbye. At that point, she also didn't know what happened to Reba, so she told her human "angels" to look for her. The recently retired paramedic stayed at the accident site with several other bystanders looking for Reba. After the helicopter took off, Reba poked her head out from between two cars and allowed herself to be caught. Since Reba can't talk, we can only assume that she was thrown out a window, and clear of the accident, from the impact.

By the time we arrived at the hospital and assured ourselves that Mom was going to be okay, it was very early in the morning, so we left Mom in the ICU staff's capable hands and headed to a hotel to catch some sleep.

The days after the accident are both a blur and crystal clear. I'll get to them within the next few days.

~~~

These past 365 days have been HARD. There are far more good days than bad (for me at least), but that doesn't make it any less hard. Perhaps the worst thing, even worse than losing the man who raised me, has been watching Mom go through such unimaginable heartbreak so bravely. She and Bill were inseparable, so not only is she having to heal physically, but she's having to do it without her other half.

And Then There Were Three

One of the things that was important to my family, especially my grandmother and great-grandmother, was the fact that we had so many living generations. But not just living generations, no, living generations of women. That was very important to them. (I can't get the picture to insert properly, sorry 'bout that.)

Grandma Juanita, Ashinator, me, Great-Grandma Wheeler, Mom

Great-Grandma Wheeler died twenty or so years ago, leaving our family with only four generations. It was sad, but the hope was always there that we'd get back up to five. After all, we come from some tough stock, but we couldn't count on it, because Ashee was just a baby. When she and Micky got married in August, Grandma Juanita started wondering when we were going to get five.

Sorry for the blurry picture, it's the only one I have.

Sadly, it looks like we'll never make it to five generations again. Grandma Juanita passed away on Saturday, January 27 at 89 years old. It's been a shock, because up until the week before Christmas she'd been her usual ornery, sassy self.

On her 89th birthday

Her hospital visit before Christmas was short - she'd pulled a muscle in her back, but when she went to have it looked at, the docs realized she had Congestive Heart Failure. Now, CHF always sounds terrible, but there are a lot of people who can manage it well, and it appeared Grandma was one of them. Some diuretic and potassium and she was good as new. Well, as good as she was before.

Her back healed up and she resumed life as though nothing had happened. She had always said she was going to live to 107 (it started as 104, but kept getting prolonged), and we had no reason to doubt her.

Unfortunately, she developed a UTI and got severely dehydrated. Mom took her to the hospital, where they found not only a UTI and dehydration, but pneumonia and sepsis. Some IV fluids and antibiotics, and it looked like she was going to beat it. Mom made arrangements for her to go to a nursing home until she was strong enough to move back into her own place. Grandma never made it to the nursing home.

As incredibly hard as it is to lose Grandma, I'm thankful that she didn't suffer a long, protracted illness. She was fiercely independent and able to live on her own right up until she was hospitalized. Pneumonia is the great killer of the elderly, and it strikes fairly quickly, for which I am thankful. I know it would have been devastating for Grandma to lose her quality of life through cancer or a stroke.

Mom might be the bionic cowgirl, but she got her basic toughness from Grandma Juanita who suffered from polio as a child. You wouldn't know that one leg was two inches shorter than the other, or that she had scoliosis so bad that one side of her rib cage touched her hip bone. Not once did she complain, she just did what needed doing her whole life. I hope to be half as tough as those two women.

It's very weird knowing we only have three generations now; this is the "smallest" my family has ever been. It's very weird that Mom is now the matriarch (she can't ever, ever die).

I never got over the fact that there was no longer Lava soap in the bathroom after Grandpa Ed died (31 years ago, and I still look for that stupid soap), and I'm not sure I'll get over the fact that Grandma will no longer be sitting at her kitchen table, deck of cards in hand, ready to kick our butts in Gin Rummy.