The Gift Giver

Keith is at the point in his life where he regularly checks the obituaries. At least once a week he logs on to the website of a funeral home in his hometown. Sometimes he knows the deceased, sometimes not, but last Wednesday a name arrested his attention.

Bert Kluver.

As in one of his parent's closest friends, someone who has known Keith all his life. Someone who has been a permanent fixture on Keith's landscape for as long as he can remember. Someone Keith held in high regard.

We wrestled with the decision to drive down. Pastors can't just take off whenever they please. Subs are hard to find, so when someone offered to fill in, we left before he could change his mind.

Keith elected not to take our roomy gas-guzzling passenger van. Instead we (him, me, and our two youngest daughters) squeezed into our tiny fuel-efficient Geo Metro for the nine hour drive south. Oy! Thank goodness for Taco Bell and car movies on laptops to take our minds off the close quarters.

Though gathered for a sad occasion, it was soul satisfying to embrace family members. To gather from our far flung ports of call because a family link was missing. To reconnect and circle in with remaining family members to speak family to one another. To know that though we don't agree with everything each other says or does we love unconditionally because we're family. Technically I don't have a drop of Vik/Johnson blood in me but love grafted me into the family tree.

Bert Kluver. A gentle man. Quiet with a dry sense of humor. Kind, honest, hard-working. The epitome of faithfulness, he was married to the same woman for 58 years, worked at the same job for 36 years, and lived in the same house and attended the same church for six decades.

Bert's daughter wrote a beautiful eulogy that Keith read at the funeral. Keith began by saying his name was Keith Vik, for which he was eternally thankful. Seems Bert and Keith's father, Elmer, before Keith's birth had toyed with the idea of giving the new baby a combination of their two first names. My husband is very grateful they went with "Keith" instead of "Elbert."

Keith shared that their two families had spent countless hours at each other's homes over the years. As a boy, Keith loved the different toys and the tomato ketchup dispenser at the Kluver's house but often grew fidgety and restless when the adults sat around for hours talking and drinking coffee. Then when Keith became an adult he found to his surprise that he enjoyed drinking coffee and sitting around talking.

The Kluver home was a magnet and neighborhood kids played countless games of baseball and football on the front lawn.

A neighbor commented that "Those kids are tearing up your grass." To which Bert replied, "I'm growing kids, not grass."

Once when Bert's son and his buddies played ball in the front yard, a bat went sailing through the living room window, scattering glass all over the floor.  The kids froze and looked over at the window where they saw Bert reading the newspaper in the living room. Bert briefly stopped, looked over the top of his paper and went back to reading. He never said a word.

90 years is a long time to live. His once strong body had weakened, his hearing was bad, and he moved slow. He kept busy but dearly missed his deceased wife. Nobody begrudges Bert his departure, but we didn't want him to go.Though he had run a good race, we weren't willing for it to be over.

Keith concluded the eulogy by saying that he had taken his childhood for granted. Until he left home he had no way of knowing that everyone hadn't grown up like he did. As an adult he realized that the solid foundation of faith, family, friendship, faithfulness, and simplicity had anchored his life.

He addressed his cousins, saying, "Kent and Nancy, our parents gave us the gift of a happy childhood and I will always be thankful. They were the gift givers and we were very blessed."

Indeed.

"Grief is the price we pay for love."  ~ Queen Elizabeth II ~