In 1975, my family and I moved westward to Powhatan County. In the Spring of 1976, Grandma was rushed to the Kenner Army Hospital at Fort Lee, a couple of miles outside Petersburg, Virginia. Grandpa was a navy veteran and had proudly served in both World Wars. Grandma was diagnosed with colon cancer and had her colon removed. Even though colon cancer ran on her side of the family, it still caught everyone by surprise. Grandma was a southerner, and she would fry everything we ate. That is probably why so many in her family died early of colon cancer, but at the time nobody thought about healthy diets.

The summer following her operation, everything was still running smoothly on our little farm. A big garden was still planted and harvested. Grandpa had not one but two large strawberry fields. Ours was one of the first strawberry farms in Chesterfield County. Beginning in the late 60's, people would come every middle of May from as far was Richmond, Petersburg, and Colonial Heights to pick our strawberries.  I just read a line from somewhere the other day that we never fully or clearly understand the present as we are experiencing it until it is fully in the past. And now I know that makes sense. But in the summer of 1977 I really did not grasp what was happening when I was sixteen years old and had just gotten my driver's license. I did not understand that everybody that I grew up with, including the pets on our farm, were slowly dying around me. I did not see that as Fall and Winter of 1977 arrived, this would be the very last season that the three of us would share together on our little farm.