Road Tripping With ALS

Mr. & Mrs. Hackman …

We set out on this trip towards Tucson AZ, for the sole purpose of attending the wedding of our friends daughter, Talia. Her parents, Tony and Melinda (Mendy) Gomez, whom we met through ALS in San Antonio and are now family. Sadly Tony passed in July; knowing he may not be here for the wedding of his daughter he left instructions, more of that in a bit.

In typical Reyes family fashion, we arrived a bit late, hey weddings never start on time, right? Wrong! Anyway, needless to say, the ceremony was beautiful, the bride and groom looked amazing! After the formalities the guests congregated at the social or cocktail hour at the base of the beautiful venue. Where they had their choice of beverages and hors d’oeuvre’s while regaled by a Mariachi band. In order to access the social we were driven down by event staff in my new truck, which got some ooh’s and ahh’s. We were greeted by Jackie and Eric, new friends who share the same love of travel. We chatted for a bit while enjoying our cocktails and a few bites. We were soon called to the reception, after finding our table we settled in for the evening.

As expected Meg chatted up everyone at the table, I know you’re shocked. We soon discovered the reason for our table assignment, tricky Mendy. You see the guests next to us are friends of Mendy that we will be visiting near Boston. Mendy is traveling with us in the RV and staying with them.

As the evening progressed it soon came time for toast’s and the father daughter dance. I got through the toast’s with a few tears, my PBA was not on full display…yet. Then came the father daughter dance. Tony had left instructions that six of his closest family and friends would stand in for him. This simply broke me…give me a moment to compose myself. All I could think of was Kristen, my daughter as Meg took care of the water works.

I will leave you with this…
“Dance, dance, dance every chance you get .”

J Reyes