A beautiful moment in a good long life

When your family gathers this holiday season, like my sister’s did last weekend, total up how many years of life you all have. Then thank those who gave it to you.

OMAHA, Neb. -- My sister Sue Offenburger Polk turned 86 years old last weekend. Three dozen of us in her extended family celebrated with her Saturday afternoon in a party room at the beautiful Elk Ridge Village Assisted Living and Memory Care facility, where she lives now in the western reaches of this sprawling metropolitan area.

It was just as fun and crazy as our family gatherings always seem to be. I mean, we RicheBurgers gave Sue a pair of “bobbleheads” because, as we noted, “everyone ought to have a toy.”

And when it came time to sing “Happy Birthday,” our party was suddenly interrupted by four “gingerbread people’’ wearing inflated costumes that made them 8 feet tall.

A “Happy Birthday” serenade from giant gingerbread people.

Inside the costumes were Sue’s four adult children -- David Polk, of Lexington, S.C.; Beth Ginger, of Omaha; Michael Polk, also of Omaha, and Christopher Polk, of Redmond, Wash. These special gingerbread people led the rest of us in singing.

But when the costumes were abandoned and calm returned to the party room, it came with a beautiful moment.

“Mom, congratulations, you are now 86 years old,” her oldest son David, who is 63, began. “That’s a good long life, a whole lot of years.”

He paused.

The four Polks now all grown up, or mostly so. Brothers (left to right) Christopher, 58, Michael, 60, and David, 63, hoisting their sister Beth, 61. It’s a stunt the Polk boys have been pulling regularly on Beth since they were teenagers.

“But I want to give you something more to think about,” he continued. “If you take the four of us who are your children and add up our ages, it comes to 245 years. And when you think about it, you Mom are directly responsible for our 245 years of life.

“And there’s more. If you take our 245 years, and add the lives of your 15 grandchildren and your 23 great-grandchildren, the total is 865 years of human life. And it all happened because of you!”

A huge cheer and applause erupted in the party room.

Sue Polk and her four adult children. She’s “responsible,” they reminded her.

Sue seemed stunned trying to comprehend it. She lost her husband Quillie H. (“Bud”) Polk in 2018 when he was 81.

But life has continued for Sue, and for the Polk children, and the children’s children, and succeeding generations.

Life is good, you know? Really good.

And we all ought to celebrate every day of it we get.

In our extended Offenburger family, we are a collection of bobbleheads, in many ways — maybe Sue less so than the rest of us. She balanced a long career as a school board secretary with marriage, military wife, motherhood, grandmotherhood, active church life and so much more.

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You can comment on this column below or write the columnist directly by email at chuck@offenburger.com.

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