By Sandy Sanders
During her healthy days, Sunday would have been the day to wake up and get ready for church. It had been some time since she had the freedom that comes with good health.
Last Sunday morning, she did not have to worry about getting ready. She had been doing that for just two months short of 99 years. As her family stood around her bedside singing her favorite hymns, she would pull out the strength to join in the chorus.
The final breath came in the early morning hours of Sunday, July 19, 2009.
Odum, Ga., was where she took her first breath. It was Sept. 19, 1910, the third Monday of the month. Her love for her Lord, family and her church was fostered during her youth. All three became a very solid foundation for her life.
In 1929, she came to Lakeland, Ga., to visit her uncle and aunt while attending South Georgia Women’s College (VSU). He was the sheriff. There was a young deputy that worked for her uncle.
She married the deputy, and he lived to the age of 99 a few days shy of 100. Their marriage that began on Aug. 21,1930, ended 77 years later with his death. A newspaper headline about their 70th anniversary said, “At 70 years, they’ve been married longer than most folks have been alive.”
In a newspaper interview in 2000, he said of his wife, “She had been kind of the head of the operation the whole time.” This caused laughter from his wife. “Wait a minute. He’s the head,” she said, contradicting him.
In the Bible, we are taught the wife should submit to the husband. Many readers stop there without reading the part “as Christ loved the Church.” This couple knew exactly what the Holy Words meant and they lived their lives in total submission to each other. For all who knew her, you were very aware of her country cooking but especially you knew of her pound cake. Every Friday, the cake would appear sometime during the early morning hours and would rarely make it through the weekend. She did this for 60 years until a hospitalization broke the routine.
At the funeral, her children and grandchildren reflected on her life and their grandfather because as they said you could hardly speak of one without mentioning the other. One grandchild said, “the nighttime call from granddaddy that the peas were ready followed by your granny will pick you up at 6:30. You were never asked if you could help ... it was a given.”
Her grave marker will read “Alene O’Quinn Patten, September 19, 1910 - July 19, 2009.” The words read as if there is a beginning and an end but, for nearly 99 years, she left a heart full of memories for her family and friends. This legacy did not die with her. In fact, the memories bring comfort to everyone who was lucky enough to know her as I did. She was my aunt; her husband, J.D., was my mother’s brother.
