{"id":313,"date":"2014-06-12T22:36:17","date_gmt":"2014-06-13T03:36:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/?p=313"},"modified":"2014-09-21T22:26:45","modified_gmt":"2014-09-22T03:26:45","slug":"june-12th","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/?p=313","title":{"rendered":"June 12th"},"content":{"rendered":"

38 years ago today my Dad, Allan Pearce, was murdered during a home invasion at my Grandparent\u2019s house on the family farm outside Moosomin, Saskatchewan.\u00a0 He was 2 weeks from his 33rd<\/sup> birthday.\u00a0 I was born 13 days after he was killed.\u00a0 One day after his birthday.\u00a0 The day of his funeral was my due date.\u00a0 I am a posthumous child.<\/p>\n

Why am I still talking about it after all these years?\u00a0 Why am I writing about it?\u00a0 There are so many reasons.<\/p>\n

A lot of time was taken from my Dad.\u00a0 He would be turning 71 on June 24th<\/sup> this year.\u00a0 What does one accomplish between 33 and 71? \u00a0By remembering him and talking about him I make sure that what he gave up for us isn\u2019t forgotten and that he isn\u2019t forgotten.\u00a0 He was an amazing man and I am so proud to say he was my Dad.\u00a0 I\u2019ve heard some incredible stories of his generosity.\u00a0 And what I find ironic is that if the guys who killed him would have just asked him for help he would have done anything for them.\u00a0 But instead, Randy acted on his feelings of needing to feel in control and his extreme anger.\u00a0 Richard had the chance to stop it but didn\u2019t take it until it was too late.\u00a0 His words begging Randy to stop were too little too late.\u00a0 My Dad was surprised. \u00a0The struggle was fought. \u00a0The gun was fired.\u00a0 The bullet went through his heart.\u00a0 My Dad lay on the kitchen floor while they ran out the back door.<\/p>\n

A few days before my Dad was killed he said in front of a number of people that he would give his life for his family if God asked. \u00a0My Grandma was terrorized and raped during the home invasion.\u00a0 My Grandpa suffered from dementia and so was unable to defend his home, his son or his wife.\u00a0 He never really understood what had happened that day.\u00a0 My Mom was at home having breakfast with my 20 month old sister just behind a row of trees at the back of the yard.\u00a0 Thankfully Randy never got the chance to find that house. \u00a0We will never know the extent of what my Dad stopped that day.\u00a0 I\u2019m thankful for that.\u00a0 But I do know that Randy had told Richard he had wanted to kill everyone.\u00a0 The guys were caught at a bus station a couple hours later in a neighboring town.\u00a0 The trial was quick and decisive.<\/p>\n

My Dad was a singing preacher \u2013 that\u2019s my favorite description of him. \u00a0He loved to sing at the nursing home and travelling to different country churches.\u00a0 Singing on local radio stations.\u00a0 He was quiet and deep thinking but could have a conversation with anyone.\u00a0 The conversations I have missed is one of the most painful parts of not knowing him.\u00a0 What I would give to sit at the kitchen table with him and a cup of coffee.<\/p>\n

When I was growing up June was never a very happy time.\u00a0 It was the end of school and the beginning of summer but it also brought a cloud over the house.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t fully understand the cloud but I knew it was there.\u00a0 My Mom became a different person for about 6 weeks.\u00a0 From Mother\u2019s Day till the end of June.\u00a0 Including my birthday.\u00a0 Later we understood it as untreated depression and PTSD.\u00a0 My Mom never really recovered from the trauma.\u00a0 Even outside of June there was neglect.\u00a0 There was an enormous amount of anger and resentment toward me.\u00a0 We never bonded as Mother and daughter.\u00a0 I lived in a mass of confusion for years and then became enemy #1 as a teenager when she realized I was growing up.\u00a0 I was very angry for years.\u00a0 Angry that my Dad had died, angry that I never met him, angry that I then had to live in a house where I was rejected.\u00a0 \u00a0I slowly began to realize what my Mom had been through especially when I became a wife and Mom.\u00a0 I began to see the pain she had endured and how she had tried to survive.\u00a0 I began to realize that I had to choose to continue the negative cycle with my family or choose to find the positive.\u00a0 How do you find positive in murder?\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t easy.\u00a0 And it\u2019s a long story. \u00a0I started to see that even through the negativity my Mom had tried so hard to do what she felt was right by not having hatred for the men who had done this. \u00a0\u00a0Some of her methods were flawed but she tried.\u00a0 She made the effort and I saw just enough. \u00a0I decided to take what I had learned from my Mom and other family members and choose forgiveness over hate.\u00a0 I felt the overwhelming need to understand.\u00a0 I had been kept in the dark for so long.\u00a0 I went on a mission to find out as much as I could.\u00a0\u00a0 To make contact with lost family.\u00a0 To break the cycle.<\/p>\n

Jumping ahead I no longer feel the anger.\u00a0 I have made peace with my Mom, with Randy and Richard, and ultimately with murder.\u00a0 I know this won\u2019t make sense to most people.\u00a0 I just knew that I couldn\u2019t allow it to eat me alive.\u00a0 I watched that happen to my Mom and as she was taken over by auto-immune diseases, depression and ultimately cancer I knew I wanted something else.\u00a0 And I strive for it every day.<\/p>\n

I have struggled with June my whole life.\u00a0 It\u00a0feels like an imprint on my soul. I\u00a0avoided celebrating my birthday for years seeing it as a dark day based on what I had seen as a child.\u00a0 Some years I tried ignoring the anniversary, some years I allowed myself to sink into it barely able to get out.\u00a0 Other years I was just a mess trying to figure out \u201cthe right thing\u201d to do.\u00a0 After my Mom passed away 3 1\/2 years ago I thought the pain would ease up when I no longer had to look after her during this time.\u00a0 But it hasn\u2019t.\u00a0 I no longer feel the anger but I am left with sadness, respect and reverence for what was experienced that day and the days after.\u00a0 My Dad, my Mom, my sister and I, my Grandparents, my Aunts, Uncles and cousins,\u00a0 family friends and neighbors, the town of Moosomin and the men who killed him.\u00a0 The ripples are still spreading.\u00a0 My Dad now has grandchildren that have missed out. \u00a0But I have also realized that I can direct the ripples and that is what excites me.\u00a0 I am no longer a victim of the ripples I am the catalyst.<\/p>\n

I have made a new determination this year.\u00a0 I will allow myself to feel the sadness, respect and reverence for what happened.\u00a0 I will continue to observe June 12th<\/sup> in my own way. I will do my best to make it healthy and healing but it will never leave me.\u00a0 June 12th<\/sup> is part of me so I am going to stop fighting with June and embrace it.\u00a0 My Dad is my hero and needs to be remembered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

38 years ago today my Dad, Allan Pearce, was murdered during a home invasion at my Grandparent\u2019s house on the family farm outside Moosomin, Saskatchewan.\u00a0 He was 2 weeks from his 33rd birthday.\u00a0 I was born 13 days after he … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1,7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=313"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":314,"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313\/revisions\/314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/puzzle-peace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}