From the Desk of Deacon Judy

Mothers-in-law

This Sunday’s Gospel tells the story of Jesus healing Peter’s mother-in-law.

It got me thinking of my mother-in-law – Fay Falkner Quick.

I was so lucky to have known her. She was a treasure not only to me and to her son and to the entire Falkner clan, but also to her community.

For twenty years I have intended to write her story. Hopefully I will get it done one day.

Fay was a Pioneer, a Politician, and a Poet.

The Falkner/Goodwin clan was a pioneer family, arriving in Shelby County, Alabama, before 1830.

But Fay was a pioneer in her own right. Sad circumstances led her to become a single mother. She found a variety of jobs and drew upon her family to help raise her son.

She was a pioneer politician as well, the first woman elected to public office in Shelby County, in 1966, and was re-elected, unopposed, for two more terms. She was a beloved Tax Collector, yet she cringed in that back pew of Columbiana Baptist Church each time the preacher mentioned “tax collectors and sinners”. So many women office holders in Shelby County attribute their success and confidence to Fay. She was a model of professionalism for them all.

Fay loved to write poetry, tributes to family and friends on special occasions. I compiled a book of her poems, Sounding the Joy!: Poetic Tributes to “Joyful Sound” and More. Joyful Sound was the Senior Choir at her church. She loved to sing with them as well.

She was a delightful mother-in-law. We became the best of friends with our shared love of music and of God.

She spent the last few years of her life in our home, the last 11 months in a hospice bed. We had great conversations and sang hymns and show tunes to our hearts’ delight. It was such a holy moment to be with her as she took her last breath.

Organized and thoughtful, she had prepared every detail of her funeral. She chose our reading from Isaiah 40 this Sunday as one of the scripture readings when we celebrated her life:

Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted; but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint. (Isaiah 40:28-31)

Ah, such hope.

Thanks be to God, Judy Q+