RIP Tess Jones

[silverscreenselect]

Tess was Mrs. SSS's brother's mother-in-law. For the past several years, Mrs. SSS's brother has hosted pretty much all of the family functions because he has a fairly sizable bed-and-breakfast by the lake, and Tess sort of unofficially presided over all of them. She was a sparkplug of a woman, who always baked and brought all sorts of goodies to these functions. I'm not sure how old she was, but it was well in her 80s, although she could have easily passed for a woman in her 60s.

Ever since her mother died and my mother died, Mrs. SSS has viewed Tess as a substitute mother figure and the two became fairly close, so Mrs. SSS is taking this pretty hard. I think that more even than losing Tess, it's the realization that for my wife, there no longer is an "older generation." Since she's older than me and her brothers, she's pretty much going to be the oldest person at any future get togethers and that will take some getting used to. At least when we get together with my brother and his family, his in-laws are still alive.

[gsabc]

I sympathize with her loss and offer my condolences to Tess and the family. I can also empathize with her feelings. I realized last year that I was the second-oldest male on both sides of the family, at least by blood line (I also have two older BILs). It was a scary and slightly depressing thought.

[Beebs52]

Hugs to Mrs. SSS and you.

[mellytu74]

Hugs to you and Mrs. SSS.

[silverscreenselect]

We went to the funeral yesterday and I learned something interesting. I knew that Tess was from the Pittsburgh area originally (born in West Virginia) and that she moved with her daughters (including my sister-in-law) to Atlanta in the 1970s. What I didn't know was that her maiden name was Murtha and that she was actually a cousin (I'm not sure how close) to longtime Congressman John Murtha of Pennsylvania (who was also born in that same part of West Virginia).

Small world.

It was a nice ceremony. Tess was very well liked