A EULOGY IN TRIBUTE TO MY BROTHER
FREDRIC DENIS HOUSER
1921-2006
(Delivered January 27, 2006)
Big brothers leave big impressions. My big brother, Denny, was no exception.
When I think of impressions, I think of footprints, perhaps because of a poem I memorized long ago, back when we still had to read and memorize poetry. It was a poem entitled "A Psalm of Life", written by Henry W. Longfellow. I'd like to read a couple of verses.
"Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
"Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again."
My big brother left big impressions, lasting footprints.
On the day I was born, June 17, 1930, he fell into a lake. He wasn't drowned. Otherwise, we would not be here today celebrating seventy-five more years of a wonderful life.
I was born at home, as many of us were back then, and I think Mama sent him off on a church picnic that day to get him out from under foot. As a young boy, he had a well-deserved reputation for messing things up.
I remain eternally grateful to my Mama for her actions.
I have eight hours, sixty-six and a half minutes of stories, anecdotes, and memories to relate about my brother, but, in deference to you, I have reduced it to sixty-six and a half minutes.
You will be happy to hear that others have reduced it to six and a half minutes.
I will do my best.
My big brother left some lasting impressions on me...and I never resented him. HATED him sometimes....but never resented him.
I was always impressed with his intellect...and his honesty. And his determination to never give up.......to keep getting back up when he got knocked down.
And I was impressed by his sense of humor.....ESPECIALLY his sense of humor.
One of the last memories of my brother was about a month ago as we sat across the table from each other, and he related a story more than sixty-years-old.....a story he had told perhaps a thousand times. I had heard it at least a hundred.
But it never got old because of the joy he got in telling it. By the time he finished, he had interrupted himself several times with his tearful laughter.
A sense of humor leaves not only an impressive footprint. It is also a potent medicine for survival.
And he was a survivor!
But he was not alone in that journey. There was another set of footprints alongside his....just as deep, just as impressive.....for the past fifty-nine-plus years.
So we honor not one, but two people here today.....partners for almost sixty years.
Together, they raised three kids to be proud of, and to follow in the footprints they had made.
Together, they cared for her parents until their death.
Together, they looked after our mother in the last years of her life.
Together, they shared a joy.......yes, a joy......in helping to care for a beautiful granddaughter who could not care for herself. She is with us here today. Many of us would consider it to be only a burden...and there has been that.....but they have considered her a jewel, and a joy in their lives.
And in the past ten years there has been his added struggle with infirmity and some severe physical limitations.
But they were not "quittahs"........especially the one who survives. She has not quit, and she continues to leave deep footprints. I think the end of Longfellow's poem sums it up well:
"Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor, and to wait."
The greatest legacy a couple can leave is not only their children, but also their grandchildren. You will hear from two of them in a moment, Ashlee Prior and Aimee Livers.
But first I would like to leave you with this reminder. The true heroes of life are not necessarily the GREAT MEN Longfellow mentions in his poem. The great scorekeeper of life does not use the same measure of accomplishment that we humans do.
Grantland Rice, perhaps the best sportswriter of the twentieth century said it much better than I could. He put it into a poem that ends:
"For when the one Great Scorer comes,
To write against your name,
He marks----not that you won or lost,
But how you played the game."
Let us never forget who is keeping score. My brother has gone on to meet with the Great Scorer, and I have no doubt that he will hear, "You done good."
I say to his partner here today something that we do not say nearly enough, "You done good", and "You're doing good."
And when you go to join him, we have no doubt that you will hear, "You done good. You done good".