Bobby's Celebration of Life

Bobby's celebration of life memorial service was held today down at the American Legion Post in Derby NY. There was a military flag service and then lunch. There were a lot of people in attendance. 

We went down there with Dave and Donna who drove and we met Sean and Ashley who drove across the state from their house. They had decided to stay overnight at our house so we went home from Derby with them instead of D&D. 

As I said there were a lot of people there. Lots of family and friends. I think he was with Val for about 15 years and he was part of our family too. We had just seen him at our house for dinner on Christmas Eve. We knew at the time that there was something wrong with his health but we certainly didn't expect him to be gone so soon. Towards the end he knew he was dying from ALS and planned his funeral services. He wanted to be cremated and he wanted to have a memorial service party with family and friends at this particular American Legion Post which was the same one that had a service for his brother. Bob served in the Army.

Coming from Val's family were Dave and Donna, me and Becky, Sean and Ashley, Nina and George, Maria and Ron and Steve. There were many friends there. I did run into a old friend from the Parkside Board, Jerry. I did have a few interesting conversations with a couple of other guys... veterans and members of the post.

It was kind of odd that there were no speakers at the service. Nobody said anything although there was a microphone and speakers set up. Maybe there was going to be some entertainment at some time because we did see I guy moving around with a guitar but he never took the stage. Nobody went up to greet the people attending the service and there were people coming up to talk about Bob or any memorial comments. Not from any family members, not from Val. Maybe that was how Bob wanted it but there should at least have been someone to welcome the folks coming to the service.

Also the food buffet was very mediocre at best. I was surprised it was that bad but I wasn't expecting too much because American Legion and VFW posts are really not known for their food quality which is all very basic stuff. I had a few bites of a roast beef sandwich and that was it. 

Well, except for a piece of cake that Becky and I split. That was from a nice bakery somewhere. It was funny that Maria and Steve were recruited to cut the cake and they came prepared with little black gloves. It sure looked like they've done it before.

We all left around 4:30 as were a lot of the people. We said goodbye to Dave and Donna in the parking lot and thanked them for letting us ride with them to the service and then we left for home with Sean and Ashley.