The Words I Spoke

Again, this is hard for me to post, but I do it for the people who could not be with us in person, but in spirit.  Your love for my Father has reached the depths of my soul and I post this for you.  The following words were spoken with shaking hands and what I hope was a clear voice.  When I did look up, the mass of people who were there for my Father, were blurred lines of color and sadness.  I will always remember the morning I wrote these words, huddled in blankets with tears streaming down my face.  My fingers flying over the keyboard faster than the thoughts came to mind.  This is where I could "give in."  The comfort of words.  Peace be with you~Kassie

My name is Kassandra-Kassie Bush-Mayo and I am 

one of Tim’s eldest.

Three days before my father’s death, I found myself asking God in bitter anguish, “How much can one human take?”  The answer unfortunately came throughout the following days. Upon learning of my dad’s death and watching my family fall apart, put each other back together, and partake in traditions new and old, I felt God answer me in this way, “It’s not a question of how much a human can take, because I created you to survive the very worst this world could give” and what could be worse than the moment we currently are in? “But, when I created you, I gave you a gift, your spirit, your soul.  And I gave you that gift to show you just how much I love you and how much I don’t want you to just survive, but how much I long for you to choose to thrive in this life.”  This means that we are each given a chance, a choice, to choose how we are going to allow these circumstances affect our lives and our souls.

When I look out among you and see the love and the hurt and the pain of the loss of a very good friend, a hardworking co-worker, an awesome uncle, the best of brothers, a forever father, and a loving husband, I see that my Dad choose to thrive throughout the pain in this life.  Which is why it is so easy for us to celebrate his life.

In closing, I would like to read to you a portion of a song that my father would quote me often as “that Tim McGraw song” and it just so happened to be the very first song we heard on the radio the night we lit the fire for Dad.

I was early in my 40’s with a lot of life before me, and a moment came that stopped me in my tracks.

I was finally the husband that most the time I wasn’t. And I became a friend a friend would like to have. And all the sudden goin fishing wasn’t such an imposition and I went three times that year I lost my dad.  Well I finally read the good book, and I took a good long hard look at what I’d do if I could do it all again.

Like tomorrow was a gift and you’ve got eternity to think about what would you do with it, what could you do with it, what can I-what can you do with it

I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter and I gave forgiveness I’ve been denying, he said

To the love of my life, to my beautiful daughters, to the sons and son in laws I’m so proud of, to my grandbaby girls, my brothers and my sisters, to my family, my hunting buddies and my friends, I hope you get the chance to live like you were dyin