Life is full of changes. Good byes are the hardest.

For 53 years I have been going to the old place and Uncle Neal has been there. Yesterday when I left he was sitting out in the yard, with sons and brothers-in-law sitting around. They had just come back from riding around the farm in the pick-up to look at the newly planted pecan trees. 50 are in the ground and 200 more are planned. The Old Place will be a pecan grove in a few years. But I won't ever go back to that place and see Uncle Neal there again. He's still his old self today, shaking my hand and calling me paaahdner, but he only has a few weeks longer to live with his lung cancer. He joked about not buying any green bananas. It was hard for me to drive away into the the sunny afternoon and come back to Atlanta. I'm sad about this coming change. I've had lots of aunts and uncles, but he and aunt Belle have always been my favorite.

We've lost some important people in the last year and a half. Mama, Uncle Hubert, my cousin Hugh, and now Uncle Neal. When a generation of giants begins to die, it seems that there is just continual loss. Good byes are hard.