Roger always insisted that every little thing that you learn to do is useful for a purpose. Sometimes you don't even know the purpose. I've kind of heard that advice all of my life, and I totally agree. That might be why I have always felt like being a lifelong learner was far better than getting your hard earned degree and just stopping there. Roger was a serious lifelong learner. I don't think he ever read anything that he did not remember. And he remembered the most absurd things that most of us would just breeze over and not think about. I often thought that he should have been a college professor, but clearly he did what he loved and felt was much more suitable for him. Plus, he had a LOT of time off! Work hard, play hard....and chill a fair amount of the time too. It is the chilling time when he spent his time in Windermere. With people.
I spent a fair amount of my time draping stage sets for everything from theatre shows, awards ceremonies and banquets and it was enjoyable. They were happy occasions. This is a sad occasion and yet, because I chose to get involved and assist by offering a skill that was fairly easy for me, it became very therapeutic for me. Tonight's memorial is a community thing. It is a time where we can gather in support of not only Officer Robbie, but for the our entire Police Department. We always appreciate our Officers, but we don't often say so. We do the same for almost all of our first responders, and especially our Armed Forces. We just don't say thank you often enough. Why is it that it takes a tragedy for people to come together?
I'm so glad that the town planners chose to use Blue (for the police department) rather than black as a symbol of mourning. The drapery, indicates that we are in a period of mourning, but the blues somehow scream that there is hope. There is optimism here and that is the spirit of our community. For many years, back when we were driving across town for school and Roger was driving to the Space Coast for work, people asked why we did not move East. He never would. We actually never wanted to. Leaving Orlando and entering Windermere was like going on a vacation. Every day.
I remember when Maguire was a two lane road with no street lights. You turned off of SR 50 and it was time to de-compress. Ahhhhhhh. It is not really that way anymore, but when I cross the bridge, I still feel it. Ahhhhh. There is no place like Windermere. Quite frankly, I am more than ready for the media to leave, for the helicopters to go elsewhere, for us to return to a sleepy little place that no one knows about or cares about.
But for the moment, caring is good, and there is a lot of caring going on here. Roger's Lesson would most definitely be "CARE".... I know he would be so very upset about what took place last Saturday morning, but I also know that he would have been so proud of his little community. It really was his little bit of heaven on earth and it is ours too! And people care.
Yep....it is like no other.
And Officer German was part of it...and made it better for all of us.
Thank you so much!
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