Life in the Durst Home

I had Anthony read my talk before I got up yesterday at my grandmas services to make sure it was ok… He said yes, it’s good; just don’t read it line for line because your grammar stinks!

So all you readers already know that my grammar is not so Great, So if you would like to read it go for it! 

Shirlene Evenson, better know in our home as Grandma lived a long life. My heart is filled with mixed emotions, I am sad because I love her so much; she was my mother, my friend, my comfort. I am so happy for her, she is no longer in pain, she is with her eternal companion- my grandfather, as well as her daughter, Mother and those in which she loved. I know that she is happy, and no longer in pain. I am so blessed with knowing that I will see her again.

When you look Mother up in the Dictionary it reads Nurtures in the manner of a mother, to look after or care as a mother does.

Grandma was that person, she wrote a short story about all her children, and I just felt very inspired to read the first page,

            My Mother died when I was two years old, and I had a very in-secure, unhappy childhood. When I was thirteen I was sent by my stepmother to live in a foster home in Los Angeles. I think this is when I found out what Family is all about.

            I was a very rebellious teenager and I’m sure that I was the cause of many gray hairs that appeared on my foster mothers head. But she undauntedly kept me on the straight and narrow (or tried) and she instilled in me many of the principles of the Gospel. It took many years for me to understand all that she wanted for me, but now that I do I love her dearly for it.

            It would be easy to say that we just wanted to give these poor little children a home. But the truth is that they’re filling a very special need in me with their love just as I do in loving them.”

Grandma opens her heart and her home to many children for 34 years of her life. She loved us all, as if we where her own.

            Her patriarch blessing says that her greatest mission of her life shall be fulfilled in motherhood. 

Grandma didn’t know how not to be a mother, she loved everyone; her forgiving heart will always touch me.

Grandma always put other people/children needs before herself. In her home I learned how important family is, and how you don’t have to have the same blood line to be brothers and sisters.

Grandma taught us by example.

She always aloud us to do what we felt we needed to do; she gave us our agency, and let us learn from our own mistakes. She would have given us the world if she had it to give.

I loved to stay up late and just watch a good movie with her, we would both end up crying if it was really good, Grandma loved to get lost in a good book, and to make blankets, She also enjoyed writing short stories and poetry.

She loved watching a child’s birth, and she would cry a sweet cry as the baby entered the world, even as a nurse, the other nurses would tease her and say oh know, Evenson is crying again. She could see how important children our and loved us all from the beginning.

Seeing how it has been so hot, I thought I would share a memories with you, when I was young my grandmother would always sit out in the back yard and watch us swim. When she got really hot, she would just walk right into the pool fully dressed, and then come to the top of the water and scream in shock with the pool water being so cold..

             I am going to miss our talks, I am going to miss her stories, I am going to miss her forgiving compassionate heart and I hope that I can be ½ as good of a mother and friend as she was to me. Grandma I love you, I look forward to hearing the stories that you will share when we meet again.