The Night of Passage

Samuel Allie Woodiel
March 6, 1902 - June 14, 1988

Except for four years during World War II when he worked in a defense plant near Little Rock, S.A. Woodiel lived and worked in Crockett's Bluff from the early 1930s until his death in 1988.  This is an account of his death at the Bluff, June 14, 1988 by his son-in-law Ken Shireman who, along with his wife Maureen (Woodiel) Shireman and her brothers Shelby and Billy and their mother Lucille, were present.

We arrived at Crockett's Bluff at 12:45 and S.A. was asleep, breathing very shallow with brief periods of gasping.  The night was clear and warm.  I walked back outside after we sat with him for a while.  The big dipper was at about the 10:00 position.  I walked Billy back to the trailer and we lit the pilot light on the water heater.  Whiskers, the new family dog, was my constant campaion.  Later, as Shelby and I sat at the kitchen table we talked about the good times we had all shared, particularly those of John and Gary with Papaw.  I asked Shelby if he expected S.A. to wake up and he said, "No" . . . which confirmed my observations.  I felt death to be no more than a few hours away.  I went to Maureen where she sat on the bed and said, "You do realize that he isn't going to wake up don't you?"  She then began to talk to S.A. and said, "It's me, it's Maureen, I'm with you."  He turned his head toward her and opened his eyes in narrow slits and uttered a word which sounded like "I". I felt he wanted to speak but the strength was no longer there.  She then began to say  "Mother is alright, Shelby and Ken are here . . . Billy is here . . . you have been strong for so long but you do not have to be now.  It's OK to relax, to let go."  I seemed to sense a release at that point . . .I went back outside.  
 
A fox was barking and a lone owl was hooting.  The big dipper had progressed to about the 8:00 position in its counter-clockwise rotation.  Shelby came out and we stood and watched as the cup on the dipper began to descend into the tree line.  We talked some about the stars and the universe, then went back inside.  

I sat in a side chair against the west wall of the bedroom with my feet very near the bed.  Maureen's mother Lucille sat very close to S.A. on the bed watching his face intently.  Maureen put her arm around her and moved closer, searching for the weak signs that life was still there . . . I was awe struck by what I saw . . . The small night light near the floor cast a half light on their faces and projected their larger than life-size shadows in the corner of the room.  It was as if the shadows were watching, overseeing the event unfolding before us.  I moved closer and watched as the breaths became weaker . . . death was near.

Here on a high bluff on the west bank of the White River . . . daylight seems to arrive a bit earlier, and as it was just barely beginning to get light I left the house for a walk.    Three foxes were in a social disagreement about something and their playful barks and snarls were waking the day.  Whiskers bolted at the sound to break it up.  I walked past the end of the drive and turned toward Schwab's store . . . long since closed.  The nightwatcher cast its mercury glow on the emptiness of the road.  I remembered what S.A. had said on a tape that we made Thanksgiving and sent to my son John in Colorado . . . "You don't have to worry about us out here . . . it's just about as dead as it can be."  I turned and looked west down the road, past the post office.  No car lights, and you could see for miles.  I started back to the house expecting to find that it would be all over for S.A.  Birds were beginning to awaken . . . and I heard one very persistent whipporwhill.  The foxes were still yippig and Whiskers walked beside me.  I looked again at the big dipper.  It had slowly continued it's north star orbit as it has done since this planet has existed.  The only part visible as it slowly set behind the trees was the last three stars of the handle.  As I walked to the bed, Shelby, Lucille and Maureen were huddled closely to S.A.  Lucille said "He hasn't moved his hands . . . he's been moving his hands."  Maureen said "Look Mother, he's still breathing."  I sat beside Shelby on the bed and placed my hand on S.A.'s abdomen.  I counted for 15 seonds before I felt a breath.  Shelby had his fingers of his left hand tucked under the rib cage near the heart and Maureen had her hand on his neck.  Lucille was holding his hand.  I counted for 32 seconds before I felt another feeble breath.  We were silently awaiting the end.  After another lapse of 35 seconds I felt a breath accompanied by a weak gasp and I knew it was the last.  His energy, his life force was gone.  I leaned to Shelby and said "I'm going to get Billy" who was asleep in Jack's trailer.  Shelby said "His heart just stopped."  I pushed the call button near the phone which rang the bell in the trailer four times and started my walk.  Billy was just starting to open the door when I arrived.  "He's gone," I said.  We walked back to the house . . . I don't remember what we said except that as Billy opened the screen door he said, "I'll never be the man that he was."  It reminded me of a comment by Shelby's.  "Even if somebody put the screws to him, he always found something good to say about them."  We walked into the bedroom, everybody embraced everybody.  It was over.  We began to perform our different tasks of consolation.  The already prepared list of phone numbers sat by the phone and coffee pot.  Billy and Shelby began calling and Maureen sat with her mother.  Billy and Shelby walked back into the bedroom. . . they both in turn lifted S.A.'s jaw which held his mouth open wide.  Maureen had already closed his eyes, but his jaw would not remain.  After they left the room, I lifted his head and rearranged the pillows, tilting his head forward.  I then rolled the blanket and tucked it under his chin.  It then held his mouth almost closed. 

I thought of the days when the family would prepare and dress the body for burial.  I thought, "I could do that.  It wouldn't be so bad, maybe even pleasant, a sort of last act of service to the loved one."  I watched as the color was quickly fading from S.A.'s face.  It reminded me of how when you catch a trout, when they die, how quickly the color fades.  Shelby had called John Hestir, the family doctor and the Essex funeral home, to send an ambulance.  I walked outside to wait.  The sun was not yet up but it was good light.  He had died at about 5:05 A.M. 

Shelby and Billy walked outside with the portable phone and did some more calling.  It wasn't long before Hestir arrived and they went inside.  We had seen one fox near the end of the drive.  I called Jason and told him, and Maureen called John.  When the ambulance arrived we took the stretcher inside.  Hestir and I got on S.A.'s right side with Cooper and Billy on the other and Shelby at his feet.  We gently lifted him to the dolly.  Cooper covered him with a blue terry cloth robe and we all helped put him in the ambulance, as if we were all needed.  He probably didn't weigh 115 pounds but everybody wanted to feel like we had a hand in it.  It was our last act we would ever perform for him.  The grandsons would be the pallbearers . . . it was over . . . Cooper drove away.  Spencer and Sevella Parker came over and all of the men stood outside and talked as the women sat in the kitchen. . . It reminded me of our childhood school days and that S.A. was a school teacher.  How the boys and girls gather in their respective circles.  The sun was just peeking through the trees.  We talked of good times . . . most of the mourning had been done . . I thought . . .how can anybody leave this world any better . . . A beautiful summer day . . .owls and birds calling . . . foxes alive with their playfulness and the hands of loved ones on you as you begin to sleep the big sleep.  It just doesn't get any better.

The funeral was two days later.  As the family waited near the front of the church to enter the sanctuary the center of our attention was Mary Catherine, the youngest great grandchild.  She was the symbol or perhaps the actual rebirth or resurrection of the spirit.  I do not know where the life force comes from or to what great reservoir it returns, but maybe through a transformation process that transcends our understanding, part of it flows to the young who carry it into the future generations.  I know that when I look at Mary Catherine and the other young members of the family I will always see a part of the spirit and energy of S.A. Woodiel.  His passage has been completed.

S.A. Woodiel died June 14, 1988 at 5:05 A.M.

 Ken Shireman, June 15, 1988