This website started so that Karen and I could keep everybody up to date on her battle with cancer, but that’s not what I want it to be about forever. Karen’s influence upon this world is not limited to her cancer.
Karen and I didn’t have children, but we’re going to leave our mark on the world in other ways. We have nieces and nephews. We have friends and their families. I’d like to make this website a place where they can get to know her.
Over the last few years I’ve asked people for their stories about Karen, and there are people, friends and family, who are considering what they might write for this blog.
Several have reached out to me to share stories, but were unwilling to share them publicly on her website. I don’t want to seem uncaring, but I don’t feel the need to learn anything new about Karen. She and I shared what we wanted to share. We asked questions, or didn’t. There isn’t a single thing I feel the need to learn that I don’t already know. The only thing I want to do is to allow people to share their stories publicly, if they choose to do so. I do reserve the right to moderate.
Who was Karen? Who were we together? I have an excerpt from our time together that I’m willing to share to get us started on the topic. This is a recording of us being interviewed for a local radio show. We did this radio show as a favor to the Columbus Chamber of Commerce, because of all of the great stuff they had done for us. Neither of us really wanted to be on the radio, but we did want to help the people what were helping us. Karen was nervous about the show, and told me that I needed to do most of the talking.
I just listened to this recording again, and teared up during much of it. I miss Karen.
I want to share other excerpts from Karen’s life, so that others get to know her. Do you have something you want to share about Karen? If you do, I’d love to share it on the blog.
Karen was a happy baby who loved her daddy; she was born on Fathers’ Day, 1971 and often used her Easy Bake oven to make cookies and cakes for her dad. She liked to play “dress up” and I used to shop at a local thrift store for clothes she could use. When she would see dandelions in the lawn at our house on Catherine St. in Youngstown she would think they were “flowers” and pick them for me. I often wished she would bring me flowers and later on in her life she often did. I appreciated her loving gestures.