Joyce Esther Bishop Katzman

Joyce is gradually moving on to wherever we go when that time come for us. For her, it will be a sunny white Palace–very, very clean because Norwegian girls are like that–filled with puppies and children, because she has too much love within her for just one of anything.

There will be flowers everywhere and there will be horses running wherever she looks, because that woman loves horses. I hope when she needs me, she will squeeze my heart a little to let me know she’s watching me and caring, still caring.

Women like Joyce are like stars falling to Earth, but just for a little while to fill others with light and happiness. A moment with her in your life can be an eternity if you will let it linger. She has that quality as too many people already know, because so many are calling me.

She wanted to be at home when her time came, she wanted me to be at her side, she wanted all four of her children with her, and she wanted flowers everywhere. That is how it is today, and that’s how it will be. All of them came: first Rachel, then together Lisa, David and Sarah, crowding around her, kissing her, touching, her listening to her breathe.

I hope that beautiful woman somehow is aware that as she leaves us, she went on her way afloat a waves of kisses, a cocoon of kisses to protect her, then release her and allow her essence to dissolve into the clouds, into the the air and into the wind.

Joy may be moving on, somewhere, but Joy’s Garden will grow for a century.

She saw it from the outside yesterday, then she turned her lovely beaming face to me and smiled, telling me she loved it. That moment was a gift from her to me and I will keep it as I watch our Maple Tree grow and see our grandchildren sit under it and ask me questions about their Grandma and what was she like.

I will tell them to look up at a starry sky at night, or find a meadow covered with a million wildflowers turning their petals up to the sunlight, filling themselves with warmth from millions of miles away.

I will tell them their Grandma made people feel good about themselves, made them feel welcome whenever they came to her house and that when her friends or family had something to say, even if it was about pain and sorrow, she would never be too busy to listen.

I’ll say that was who their Grandma was. That is who Joyce is to me right now as she silently ebbs away. That is what I will hold onto when I think about what a gift Joyce has been in so many lives.

God bless you Joyce.

But then, He already has.

As I type these words and when I hear her breathing stop, the silence is so loud I feel like the Universe is clapping hands.

I’ll be seeing you, baby.

Wait for me, will you?

Love,

Your eternal paperboy

Bob

Joyce Esther Bishop Katzman died at 5 PM, Mother’s Day, with her children around her, on May 14, 2017

She is survived by her first daughter, Lisa Heather, married to Terry Wister, parents of Eli and Talia; David, our only son, married to Nicole, parents of Emjay; second daughter, Rachel Jennifer married to Gary Farr, parents of Jakobi and Jericho; third daughter Sarah Hannah, now a UW college sophomore and who has exceeded her parents in their formal education. Me? After 42 years together, I’m not so sure I’m surviving losing her.

These seven adults are truly wonderful people, caring, loving to me, so helpful to both of us when Joy was alive and so incredibly indispensable to me now when I’m falling apart.

If they are all this way, all selfless and giving, then its no accident that Joy was a major influential presence in their lives. The good in Joy rubbed off on everyone she came to know, and her children? Well God knows they were all overdosed by her Viking Queen (my decades old name for her) decency, emotional openness, strong when they needed it and soft when their hearts cried out for it.

They don’t come any finer than Joyce Esther Bishop Katzman.

Funeral services will be held Sunday, May 21, 2017, 12:00 P.M. at the funeral home with Rabbi Martyn Adelberg officiating.