Honnoring my son for Memorial day.

We were so happy to have a baby at last. He had a lot of curly blond hair when he was born ,but as you can see it quickly disappeared and I soon found he had inherited my father's unmanageable hair. Daddy was so meticulous about his, he must have combed twenty times a day. This was not in his nature at all. He often looked like a wild boy. He was colicky the first few months and I thought I would not survive this.His dad was driving truck but when he got home after very little sleep, I would meet him at the door and say "Take this kid." Terry was small so would fit in his large hand and he sat up in bed sleeping but still tittering the baby. It was a sight to behold. I would try to grab a few winks while I good. This eventually passed and we actually started to enjoy him.
The second picture is he and Michale,. Flora and Darwins baby. We had all been waiting for a long time for this happy event. Flora had miscarriages and I couldn't get pregnant. When we finally got the little darlings we could spend hours just admiring them. They were so cute and extra smart we felt.

We were living out to the radio station west of Cedar City. When Terry was just over two I was mowing the lawn and suddenly missed him. Talk about a panic. I jumped in the car and went down the road after screaming and running around frantically. About a half mile down the road. I see my precious baby pulling his little red wagon. I asked him where he was going. He said" Going to town". He had a pair of clean overalls and his teddy bear in the wagon. All the important things. I was so grateful there was no traffic on that road at that time. This was portent of things to come. Terry was always on the go and hard to keep track of. he was fearless which didn't help my nerves. Driving wildly, climbing ledges, and riding in Boulder rodeos when he had virtually no practice.

I'll try to post a picture of Terry with our dog Tux. The dog had chosen Terry as a favorite and he knew what he was doing. Terry was very tender with all creatures all his life. One time Tux had to have a tick removed from his ear and as he started coming out of the anesthetic he was flopping around as animals seem to do. Terry sat up all night holding his head so he wouldn't hurt himself. When Terry went to Escalante to school about a half hour before time for the bus to be at our house Tux would go out and sit waiting for it. He and Terry would be so happy to see each other,

Unfortunately it was about this time Terry began his painful journey of Alcoholism. Of course this became a bigger difficulty as he grew up and went in the service. He came home from the army with an Austrian wife and two darling little girls. It was a battle of wills from the beginning, and drinking added another very difficult element. It was a relief when the marriage finally ended. Terry loved his daughters with a passion and always tried to do the best he could by them. He taught himself all the elements of construction and got his license without having to attend a great deal of school. He taught himself all the computer programs needed for his work. It seemed his timing was always off, as far as making money even though he did beautiful work.As he got sicker and sicker, I tried everything I could think of to help him to quit drinking. It seemed three months was about his limit to stay sober.He was fun loving and attracted many women but this only seemed to add to his problems. He told me sometimes he felt he was hanging on by his fingernails.

I, of course felt we had been bad parents and done everything wrong. I was talking about this with Terry one time and he told me that his very best memories in life was all of us as a family sitting around the kitchen table making jokes and laughing really hard. Those Hall men were all witty. Randy said at Terry's demise that he had more fun than all the rest of us put together. He was right about that. It has been ten years since his life ended and it still feels painful, not only to me but his father and two brothers. As you think about it from my present perspective it seems his life was too short and surely too painful but we who loved him learned some great lessons from him. We remember his tenderness and his laughter.