Hollieanna Groves

It’s weird the things you remember when you’ve lost someone, especially losing someone suddenly and unexpectedly as we did with Gav. I wish I remembered everything. Every conversation. Every look. Every laugh or hug. What I said to him or shared with him the final few days of his life. I remember a lot, but unfortunately not everything.

As I’ve stated previously this journal is a way for me to remember. It’s also a way to document some specific things such as locations or experiences in the event someone wants to walk in Gavin’s footsteps at a later date.

We visited Washington DC in 2018. Conor was 9, Gavin was 8. There is a marker on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial indicating where Martin Luther King gave his “I have a Dream” speech in 1963. Gavin was moved by this and wanted to stand there for a second. He wanted to stand where a great person once stood. The details I provide in this journal about Gavin will provide others with the same opportunity.

There is a fruit stand in Maitland, Florida called Hollieanna Groves. It’s a storefront for a local orange grove. Beginning sometime around November each year they open and sell locally grown seasonal citrus. The offerings change as the citrus season moves from late autumn through February.

Rachel and I took the kids there nearly annually, sometimes more than once a year. We would buy citrus, honey, coconut patties and orange juice. Pre-COVID they had a dispenser where you could sample the orange juice using small plastic cups. Our boys loved the free orange juice. They would go back for seconds, thirds, fourths, who knows how many. Wasn’t my proudest moment, but we always supported the store and it was adorable, so we let it slide to some extent. I think Gav holds the record with six servings. Now that’s a sugar rush!

This is one of those weird, small things I remember fondly. A small shattered, or at least fractured tradition we are left figuring out what to do with.