{"id":4896,"date":"2013-03-31T11:53:40","date_gmt":"2013-03-31T15:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.communify.me\/newvinegrowing\/?p=4896"},"modified":"2019-06-07T13:39:33","modified_gmt":"2019-06-07T17:39:33","slug":"making-sense-of-the-untimely-death-of-our-neighbor-martha-atwater","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.communify.me\/newvinegrowing\/making-sense-of-the-untimely-death-of-our-neighbor-martha-atwater\/","title":{"rendered":"Making sense of the untimely death of our neighbor, Martha Atwater"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"This
This photo of Martha Atwater with a big smile is in the window of the Brooklyn Heights shop near where she died. She looks like someone I would have really liked.<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nA few weeks ago, a woman was killed in front of our Brooklyn apartment building.
\nShe walked out of the bagel shop directly below our apartment and an out-of-control driver careened up onto the sidewalk, crushing her<\/a>.
\nWe\u2019d walked past that spot not long before she died \u2013 we walk past it many times on an average a day \u2013 and when we came home, there were small signs of the tragedy, including a smashed planter in front of the bagel shop. No skid marks, though. It didn\u2019t look like the driver tried to brake.
\nThe next morning, the reminders of Martha Atwater\u2019s untimely death<\/a> grew, as people left cut flowers and potted plants in front of a little coffee, tea and spice shop we frequent.
\nMartha was just 48 and apparently both successful and beloved<\/a>. The Brooklyn Eagle wrote:<\/p>\n

Ms. Atwater, who produced such familiar children\u2019s television shows as “Clifford The Big Red Dog,” and “Goosebumps” was married to Tom Wallack and had two young daughters. She had just bought cookies for the family at the caf\u00e9.
\nHer death is a \u201ctremendous loss for Brooklyn,\u201d said fellow Brooklyn mom Karen Auster.
\n\u201cMartha was an integral part of the sisterhood of mothers in Downtown Brooklyn. The entire neighborhood has been affected, it\u2019s a nightmare realized — she went to pick up cookies for her kids and she never returned.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"People
People left cut flowers and potted plants in the spot where Martha Atwater was killed by an out of control driver.<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\nSeeing the impromptu memorial gave me chills every time. It was a tangible reminder that a life can end at any moment.
\nMartha wasn\u2019t doing something risky. She didn\u2019t dart out into a busy street. She died doing something pretty mundane, picking up cookies then walking down a sidewalk in an affluent neighborhood.
\nThere\u2019s a clich\u00e9 that we should live each day as if it\u2019s our last. Those flowers reminded me it really might be.
\nShortly thereafter, I followed a link a friend posted on Facebook for perhaps the best obituary I\u2019ve ever read. Harry Stamps<\/a> sounds like he lived each day to the fullest.
\nThis is the example I aspire to follow as I ponder our mortality:<\/p>\n

Harry Weathersby Stamps
\nDecember 19, 1932 — March 9, 2013
\nLong Beach
\nHarry Weathersby Stamps, ladies’ man, foodie, natty dresser, and accomplished traveler, died on Saturday, March 9, 2013.
\nHarry was locally sourcing his food years before chefs in California starting using cilantro and arugula (both of which he hated). For his signature bacon and tomato sandwich, he procured 100% all white Bunny Bread from Georgia, Blue Plate mayonnaise from New Orleans, Sauer’s black pepper from Virginia, home grown tomatoes from outside Oxford, and Tennessee’s Benton bacon from his bacon-of-the-month subscription. As a point of pride, he purported to remember every meal he had eaten in his 80 years of life.
\nThe women in his life were numerous. He particularly fancied smart women. He loved his mom Wilma Hartzog (deceased), who with the help of her sisters and cousins in New Hebron reared Harry after his father Walter’s death when Harry was 12. He worshipped his older sister Lynn Stamps Garner (deceased), a character in her own right, and her daughter Lynda Lightsey of Hattiesburg. He married his main squeeze Ann Moore, a home economics teacher, almost 50 years ago, with whom they had two girls Amanda Lewis of Dallas, and Alison of Starkville. He taught them to fish, to select a quality hammer, to love nature, and to just be thankful. He took great pride in stocking their tool boxes. One of his regrets was not seeing his girl, Hillary Clinton, elected President.
\nHe had a life-long love affair with deviled eggs, Lane cakes, boiled peanuts, Vienna [Vi-e-na] sausages on saltines, his homemade canned fig preserves, pork chops, turnip greens, and buttermilk served in martini glasses garnished with cornbread.
\nFinally, the family asks that in honor of Harry that you write your Congressman and ask for the repeal of Day Light Saving Time. Harry wanted everyone to get back on the Lord’s Time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is an abridged version. Read the whole version, which is just as fantastic, here: http:\/\/www.legacy.com\/obituaries\/sunherald\/obituary.aspx?n=harry-stamps&pid=163538353#storylink=cpy<\/a><\/div>\n
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Related blog posts:<\/strong><\/div>\n
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