Not good-by but until we meet again

Alleen Debra Sorenson Lang
8 December 1958 - 3 August 2007

All the ceremonies are now over and most of the people are back to their own homes. The viewings and funeral and grave side services are done. Now we will try to get back to the "new normal". I have had many thoughts of my sister over the last eight days. I remember times on the ranch when we would spend hours pounding nails in boards then walking down to the creek to launch them from the bridge. I remember Alleen repeating a TV commercial that she saw when I was ten, "Ten years old and all thumbs" and a kid in a big thumb suit would put thumb prints on everything. I remember dad and Alleen sitting together and Alleen would say "he's my daddy!" and dad would say "I'm her daddy!" how true that was. By the way for everyone out there who pronounce her name wrong, this is how to pronounce it: Al- (as in Alfred) and lean (as in Colleen) all together it's AL-lean ALLEEN. I remember when she came home from Ricks the first time and saw that I had moved into her room. I couldn't quite understand why she was so upset. I remember when I was young Alleen would tease me and pester me until I would hit her then I would get in trouble with mom and dad. That was her plan all along. I remember Christmases in Cedar City with just her and me. She would always buy me the coolest stuff. I remember having bagels and cream cheese for breakfast and thinking how Bohemian we were. I remember the little converted garage that she lived in in St. George and how cool I thought my big sister was. I remember how alone she looked when dad and I left her in a dark little apartment in Ceder City and left her 400 miles from any family and how she was crying when we left. I remember driving back from Tremonten in her first car, a light green and white Buick that I thought I would get when I could drive. She soon set me strait on that! I remember her expert use of the cowboy word and she knew all of the connotations and inflections that helped a cowboy communicate his feelings and emotions with that one word. After all a good part of a cowboy's existence is passed in and around the stuff. I remember her masterful command on the English language and her love for words and their sounds. We and our sister ReNae would make a game of trying to use as big a words as possible in our conversations to stump the others as to their meanings. Growing up I didn't have a lot of use for an older sister. I thought that I missed out on not having a brother. After we were "grown" I admired my sister very much. I admire all of my sisters but since the older three were out of the house by the time I was nine, Alleen and I were basically a separate family. I watched her struggle with not being married as soon as she thought she should and have so much trouble in bringing children to her family. I was there when Duncan was born and we watched Logan while they went to the hospital. Dave showed me the tiny little casts that were made of his arm and leg. They looked like that of a small doll. I am proud to say that I knew Alleen for nearly 45 years from my earliest memories to my hardest memories of her body in a hospital room and a casket. When I saw her Friday I knew that she was all ready gone and it was just her earthly body that remained. Looking at her body with all the tubes and wires on it, what was going through my mind was Alleen saying "$h!t, $h!t, $h!t!" meaning in cowboy talk;

"This is not what I want to be happening right now and I thought I had more to
do down here. Man, I look huge. Can't you guys fix my hair or
something? You shouldn't be making such a fuss over me; man, this is
embarrassing!"

Or something like that. Over the past few days I have felt her very close to me and even imagined her hugging me at her grave site. I know that I will see here again. Not too soon in earthly years I hope but in celestial time a mere eye blink. In trying to sooth feelings I have had well meaning people tell me their ideas on why she died when she did, as well meaning as these people are I just want to say the cowboy word because no one really knows exactly why. We will only know when we join her just how everything worked for our benefit. So I say until we meet again and not good-by. My daughter who is expected in October will have the middle name of Alleen and I suspect that I will give here the nickname of 'Leanie. My sister has touched many lives, some only through her writing but the entire world has been better because Alleen was in it for a short little while.