Richard Oostra...Monologue

Some people say I’m losing it. I guess at 93 I can admit my mind is going some. My name is Richard Oostra. I’ve lived a lot of life in my 93 years. I am the oldest of thirteen kids. There’s me, John Jr., Ralph, Marinus, Mary, Andrew, Ruth, Berdina, Gerald, Jacob, William John, Andrew, and Robert…Did you catch them all? Did you hear the two Andrews? Well you heard right. My brother, Andrew the first passed away in 1938. He was 15 only 7 years younger than I. He died of puss between one of his lungs and his liver. He had three operations. Two of the appendix and the other for the puss . My brother, Johny and I gave him blood. Johny gave twice and I gave once. It’s sad that it didn’t work. Andrew suffered a lot in his last six weeks going back and forth from the hospital and home. When he went he was at home. At the time, Ma was pregnant with Andrew the second. So we had Andrew and Andy. My childhood wasn’t all that interesting. I spent my time helping take care of the farm with my dad and helping with the kids. On August 2, 1940 I married the love of my life Geraldine Niessink . We married on her parents farm. It was a glorious day. Geraldine was a vision in her white gown. The next year my youngest brother was born. It wasn’t long after that Geraldine and I decided to have our own. My beautiful daughter, Lois Elaine, was born on April 12, 1943. On Dec. 26, 1944 my son Larry Wayne the first was born prematurely and weighed only three pounds at birth. He lived 6 days. It was hard on my family. Geraldine spent a short time with her parents shortly after returning from the hospital. Five years later we were blessed with a second son naming him Larry Wayne. Then on March 5 of 1955 Randall Dean was born. We lived a peaceful life out side of Sioux Center on an acreage. In 1964, we married Lois to a honorable young man, John Hilbelink. They presented us with our first grandchild, a boy, in ‘69. In ‘74 Larry married Twila and in ‘81 Randall married Barbara. Between the three of them, we had nine grandchildren, Stephen, Christa, Heidi, Amanda, Matthew, Aric, Drew, Tyler, and Carson. In ‘88 I lost my sister Berdina. When I was about 80 Geraldine and I moved into the assisted living facility in Sioux Center. Shortly after I had open heart surgery and felt better than I had in years about the same time we received the devastating news that Geraldine had Alzheimer‘s. I took care of her as much as I could. She was my light and I stayed by her side. It started getting bad in her last five years. The last year I didn’t leave her bed side. During that year Johny, Marinus, Ralph, and Gerald went to go meet the LORD. I didn’t leave her side even to go to their funerals. After 68 years of marriage and a long fight with the Alzheimer’s it was my beloved Geraldine’s time to go. I still live in the same nursing home, and to top it off my sisters live there. I don’t happen to visit them very often. Well I guess I better head off. I’m kinda tired.