Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Dad and his little sister Becky

by 12 Comments

I have a few images from dad’s childhood. He was six years older than his little sister, my Aunt Becky.

My dad and his baby sister.

She loved her big brother so much, when he was killed by a tired semitruck driver December 23, 2004, she was heartbroken. They are together in heaven now, I imagine it was a pretty special reunion.

Hanging out in Ann Arbor MI.

This coming Tuesday is Giving Tuesday. I hope you will consider giving to the nonprofit I’ll be highlighting, CRASH (Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways) which is a partner with P.A.T.T (Parents Against Tired Truckers) to form the Truck Safety Coalition.

One of my favorite images of the two of them.

We provide support to families of those lost in semi crashes, and to those who have survived crashes too. Every year there are more heartbroken families.

He loved being on the water.

And we work hard at changing regulations, rules and laws in order to protect everyone on the road. But the crash statistics are going up, more than 5,000 dead, almost 150,000 injured in 2021, the last year for which we have numbers.

And he loved all kinds of boats.

So we can’t give up, can’t even slow down now. Please consider helping us on our mission to provide comfort, to make a place for families to put their grief, and to make our roads safer for everyone, truck drivers included.

Wading in Charlevoix Bay.

Thank you for the years of support you’ve already given me.

Author: dawnkinster

I'm a long time banker having worked in banks since the age of 17. I took a break when I turned 50 and went back to school. I graduated right when the economy took a turn for the worst and after a year of library work found myself unemployed. I was lucky that my previous bank employer wanted me back. So here I am again, a long time banker. Change is hard.

12 thoughts on “Dad and his little sister Becky”

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  1. Dale
    November 25, 2023 at 2:44 pm

    What a beautiful collection of photos, Dawn. It’s when we are directly affected that we realise there is a serious situation out there. Tired is as dangerous as drunk.

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  2. annhay1
    November 25, 2023 at 11:06 pm

    Money sent, no hesitation. Always. Thank you for keeping this out in front of us.

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  3. Debbie
    November 26, 2023 at 1:21 pm

    Seeing your dad as a young boy with his little sister sure makes him more real to those of us unfortunate not to have known him. Thanks for continuing the good fight, Dawn!

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    • dawnkinster
      November 26, 2023 at 3:38 pm

      I sometimes just look at these photos of him as a young kid and think about all he did with his life, how those hands built things, and those eyes saw things and what a wonderful life he had, and that kid had no idea.

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  4. Linda Schaub
    November 26, 2023 at 9:50 pm

    This is a nice post reflecting on your Dad and his younger sister – it is sad they are both together, but in Heaven not here on Earth. I had looked on your site before when you alluded to the trucking accident – this is terrible. I thought that there were new regulations that truckers had to follow for the amount of hours a trucker could work without taking a break – do truckers try to have some wiggle room with those rules and regs Dawn? Too bad those restrictions were not in place back then.

    I have a high school friend that I’ve not seen since we graduated high school in 1973. Margaret and her husband live in South Carolina now, but they owned their own truck (and I’m taking this info off Margaret’s Facbook page: they were an OTR Truck Driver/team at Con-way Truckload.) In the beginning just Landon drove, but later Margaret went to truck driving school and joined her husband on the road. She was driving on a rainy day and the truck ahead of them was hauling logs, many of them stacked on a flat bed trailer. That truck slid on the slippery road, lost its load which rolled off the truck and came right toward them. Margaret swerved and tipped their truck over on her side, thus her left hip and leg were crushed. Landon had a punctured lung. I don’t know if he was beside her in the cab or sleeping. She is a friend, but we’re not that close and this was awhile ago. Margaret never drove again and went through a lot of physical therapy and is still in constant pain. In this case, it was not an overtired semitruck driver … I’ll say it was Mother Nature’s fault, but who knows … that driver may have been going too fast in weather conditions and carrying a bulky load. I am sorry for your loss of almost 20 years ago now.

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  5. Shelley@QuaintRevival.com
    November 28, 2023 at 6:44 am

    I love all those old photos. So sweet! My brother is a truck-driver and he’s amazed at how many truckers survive and how many have near death experiences. We were recently traveling and had to pass a semi, he was in the wrong lane and nearly caused us to crash. Amen to groups that help us all travel safely!

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  6. sara
    November 30, 2023 at 5:30 am

    What sweet photos. Thank you for all your hard work. I wish it wasn’t so difficult to make common sense changes.

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