We received a call on Tuesday that Les’s Grandfather Bresnehen was doing very poorly. Yesterday I received a called that he had died. Grandpa Bresnehen was truly a unique…an old school Oklahoma cowboy…hard worker…strong willed, independent built man’s man.
I was only around Grandpa Jack three or four times in our almost eight years of marriage. His self-built home was modest, full of necessary items, nothing fancy or unneeded. Pictures of his family on tops of a dresser and shelf. My own children, not of his blood, but still present in his home, on his shelf…and I suspect, in his heart. Grandpa Jack was a tall, thin man, glad to see his Grandson, my husband, and our children. Quick to pet our puppy Tator, and ask about if he’d get any bigger. (he’s a tiny black and white Peekapoo)
With death comes conflict in some families….most if you ask me….conflicts over burials, conflicts over things, and money…but the conflict I face today is how to help keep Grandpa Jack’s memory alive in his grandchildren and how to tell his Great grandchildren who he was in terms they can understand. He was a unique and pioneer of his own making….a man to be reckoned with, who lived life on his own terms and did so at his own prices….
I was proud to know such a man….and how I loved to see him lay his hand on my husband’s shoulder and without a word give him so much approval for his life…..and to know in that moment that their eyes locked…and shared a common thread that is who they are….
This morning at 10 a.m. in a simple ceremony, one of Oklahoma’s last true cowboys will be laid to rest…..the rain will be misting there…and our family will have lost another of its own.
