“My son Bryant was an affectionate, compassionate, jokester motorcycle head who loved fishing and camping.
He was very hands on mechanical. He was a Ford boy, he loved mustangs and raptors while I was a Mopar girl. We would argue about which cars were better, he even used to call my old dodge dart “mommies dodge fart.” Bryant was loyal. He would take the shirt off his back for anyone, even a complete stranger. He had a huge heart and was great at making people smile.
Everyone still talks about how Bryant gave the BEST hugs. No matter who you were, adult, kid, boy, girl or animal, he would pick you up off the ground and give you a huge bear hug.
He also had a habit of finding heart-shaped rocks wherever we went. When he was a little boy he would put these heavy heart-shaped rocks in his backpack and carry them all the way home through the Cranberry Bogs. Once, when he was eight years old, he walked a mile all the way home carrying this heavy, heavy rock. When he got home he yelled “Mom, mom come to the door!” When I opened the door he was holding this huge heart-shaped rock he had found. We painted it pink and made it a door stopper and it is still there to this day. One day, after he died, I was in the yard when all of the sudden I came across a rock and picked it up. Of course, it was a heart-shaped rock.
Bryant had great hands-on skills and loved doing home improvement projects. He once re-did the roof on the liquor store down the street and the owner still talks about what a great job he did. He also loved to climb anything and everything. He climbed trees, walls, ladders, you name it.
Bryant was my golf partner. We took pro lessons and played in tournaments together for many years. He even got a lot of the famous pro golfers to sign a few of his golf hats. He never passed up an opportunity to go to a pro golf tournament. He was into photography and often took photos for tournaments. Shortly before he died, he was working at big county police & sheriff’s golf tournament and the owner of the company took a photo of him with the winner’s trophy from that day.
I have so many good memories of Bryant. Once when he was young, we were late for school and he missed the bus. We live in a very rural country town and there are always a lot of tractors on the road in the morning. We were stuck behind one and my son said “Mom you have your cell phone just call 911.” I said “Bryant, who would I ask for?” He responded “Just ask for John Deere, his name is on the license plate! Tell him to move over I’m going to be late for the Pledge of Allegiance.”
His favorite restaurant was Wendell’s Pub. My father-in-law used to hang out there decades ago when it was a Harley Davidson bar. When it turned into a hot wings place I took Bryant there, he loved hot wings. People would come up to us and say “Wow he’s only two and he likes hot wings?!”
It is so hard to take someone’s whole life and put it into just a few words, but this is a little piece of Bryant.”
Written by Barbara McDonald