Peace, Love & Best Wishes From Dick Sabers

 I met Pat and Gerry when I married Pat’s sister, Colleen, in 1965.  I was in law school at the time, and playing baseball in the summers.  Colleen and Pat came to Salem, S.D. to watch one of our baseball games.  They sat along side the first base and one of our players hit a foul ball which struck Pat on the arm, breaking her wrist and requiring all the bridesmaids at our wedding to wear “wrist” corsages. 

    We visited them in all of the towns and cities you mentioned except their current home in Lincoln, California. 

    What great fun we had.  In Peoria, Illinois, we had a wonderful steak dinner at about 2 o’clock in the morning because we started drinking wine and martinis before trying to put a new grill together.  Our stay was frequently interrupted by shouts of, “Close the door so the dog doesn’t get out!”

    We brought Pat and Colleen’s parents, Nick and Ruth, to South Bend to watch the kids while we toured Montreal and Quebec, Canada.  Colleen inquired as to the source of the wind and Gerry promptly answered, “Trees”.  Not satisfied, Colleen asked, “What makes wind in the desert?”  Gerry promptly answered, “Camels and Arabs.”  We laughed until the map reader calmly announced, “We just got on the map and we’re already in deep trouble.”

    We had a wonderful time in Quebec watching all the girls on the boardwalk in their short, short skirts, (not too common a sight in South Dakota at the time).  There was some concern about their catching cold.  On the way home and running out of funds, we stopped to share a pizza.  Gerry put so much red hot pepper on his piece, he wanted to buy an ice cream cone and jam the whole thing in his mouth to cool off.

    We visited in Fridley, MN, Cranberry, NJ, Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, Middletown, NJ, and Westlake Village, CA.  We have met many of their great friends and Pat and Gerry continue to make a lasting impact on our lives.  Pat and Gerry or Greg and Yvonne, or Tim and Beth have visited us and Pat’s parents and our children in Sioux Falls over 30 times in the last 45 years.  The memories of joy, golf and tennis, and dining out remain in our thoughts, some more vivid than others.

    In 2012 I watched a Los Angeles Dodgers game with Greg in Phoenix and spent the next day with my daughter, Susan, and family in California at Disneyland with Greg’s family.

    Visiting Pat and Gerry in Lincoln, CA and Tim and his family are high on my bucket list. 

Until then, Peace, Love, and Best Wishes,

Dick Sabers