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Close to Nowhere
By Linda Jones Another South Reporter family member “goes home” It’s always hard to say goodbye when a family member passes away. We
here at The South Reporter are a very close-knit family. Barbara and I
have been here forever and the rest of us almost that long. And we’ve
been lucky! For the most part, we have a very harmonious work place. Louise
Pruitt was perhaps the most “elegant” of our family. Tall, stately and
dignified, she was also a very lovely person -- inside and out. And
she could cook too! That’s vital to our work family -- you have to be a
good cook or an appreciative eater! Most of us are both! We’d already lost a couple dear family members -- Marie Pryor and Fred DeBardeleben left us several years ago. Mrs.
P., as I called her because I couldn’t keep Pruitt and Pryor straight
on my tongue, was always cheerful and upbeat, ready to gossip and talk
recipes and family. She’d lost a husband and two
sons in her lifetime, that I was aware of. Her son J.J. (J.C. Pruitt
Jr.) passed away only recently. She didn’t share her pain though. She shared caring and compassion and kindness. You could count on her for anything too. Mrs.
P. was always well-dressed -- she loved clothes and shoes and jewelry
and I never saw her with her hair not done and without neat and pretty
clothes on. She’d been taking treatment for cancer and had been by to visit us just a little while before she became really sick. While
visiting her in the hospital, I was most saddened by the fact that I’d
never seen her without makeup and her hair done before. She was surrounded by love though. Neither her “blood” family or her “work” family cared about her hair or makeup. Her
hospital room was packed with family from near and far. Her brothers
and sisters were there, along with her children and many grandchildren. Family
was the most important thing to Mrs. P. She loved her siblings and her
children and their children. And she loved her work family too. Even
after she had to retire from the newspaper, she visited frequently --
and was always invited to every meal we could talk her into coming to.
I did mention she was a good cook! Her obituary is in the paper this week. It was time for her to go. But we’re sure gonna miss her!
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