Alice's Silver Years: Remembering My Brother, Howard

Sunday, July 17, 2016

Remembering My Brother, Howard

My brother, Howard, passed away a few days ago, July 11, 2016. He will forever be missed.

Howard has been on my mind so very much these past few days that I have decided to share a glimpse of some happy times we had together.

For this post I think I'll tell you about the time I visited him in his home in Derry, Northern Ireland.

In 1968 Howard married a lovely Northern Irish girl named Juliette. They were happily married for 48 years. They lived in the US for a good number of those years, but moved back to Derry, N. Ireland in the late 1990s.

Back in 2005 I was given a gift of a lifetime for my 50th birthday, nearly a month exploring Dublin, the Irish countryside, Derry, London, Paris, Venice, and Edinburgh all expenses paid. I even got to take an overnight trip on the original Orient Express train from Paris to Venice.

I truly am blessed and I know it and I'm very extraordinarily thankful every single day.

The very BEST part of that wonderful trip was I got to visit my brother, Howard, and his wife, Juliette, in their home in Londonderry, Northern Ireland, and I was able to meet and spend time with Juliette's family who all lived nearby.

Howard and Juliette's lovely home is in the city, but we visited many places while we were there.

It was so hard to leave him that trip. At the time Howard was on a list for a heart transplant. When I left, I wasn't sure I'd ever see him again. It hurt my heart to think about it at the time, but Howard did get his heart transplant in England in September of 2005. He lived almost eleven more years after that. He even got to come home to the USA to visit me in October 2011.

I am honored and privileged to have known my brother, Howard. A better man never lived. He will be missed. He will be missed. Forever and a day. Until we meet again.