Posted by Phil and Yale Weatherby on December 31, 2007:

One of the saddest things we had happen this year was the death of our good friend Vip. Yale and he knew each other from the Academy as classmates, and Shirley and I were friends for years. We both had a love for Tucson, where she was from, where she and Vip met and where we lived when Yale was in Grad school at the U of AZ many years ago. When we retired and went to live in Dallas, we would drive down to get together with the ’54 group who were in San Antonio. We were always so pleased to go and stay with Vip and Shirl….and why would you not be…..they were delightful hosts. Shirl , a great cook, and the house with many of the stained glass windows which Vip had created as a hobby after he retired from the Air Force was a joy. But most of all it was because they were fun. Who can forget Vip saying in the middle of the afternoon, that he suddenly had developed a taste for black walnut ice cream, and off we would go to find a ice cream parlor and we would all order a dish of the luscious stuff…..except when Shirl would trick me into ordering a double dip so she and I would have more….of course, she would finish the single dip, saying she couldn’t eat a bite more, and there I would be stuck with the extra dip to eat. In fact most of the time spent with them was a little like double dating back when they were cadets. None of us were young, but we felt we were. Vip was also a wonderful email pal. Where in the world he found all the stuff he sent to us, we’ll never know. Probably one of the funniest ones was a picture of some fellow on a beach, in a really outlandish lime green bathing suit……which was cut very low in the front, with straps over the shoulders, and a thong in the rear….I wrote back and asked if it came in other colors besides the lime green, and Vip replied that it certainly did, in fact Shirl was going to get one for him in fire engine red!!! The mental picture of Vip in that suit in red, was almost as funny as the original picture had been. Vip and I had some things in common. He was Italian with parents originally from the Abruzzi area, as my mother’s family had been. Vip had a small, but very elegant collection of glass ink wells, and I had a larger collection that I had started 45 years ago in Europe. We both loved pasta, (of course), and we both liked doing genealogy research. We also both loved a good joke. But we also had our differences. We were not of the same political party. I believe Vip wasn’t a believer when I first indicated the difference. Later I think he felt he really should do something to change it. He sent many, many emails to us with epistles from his side. Yale, being of a little more moderate temperament than I, would not let me answer back in any way with my side of the argument. He felt that if Vip believed that way, it was okay with him, because it is a free country. Actually, I did too, but I just want to give him a good rebuttal! He also had a hard time understanding about our living and being very happy in Mexico. He wouldn’t come to see us because in his words, “That country had no respect for US sovereignty”, and besides he couldn’t carry a concealed weapon in Mexico. It gave us many a chuckle in private. When Vip was dying in the hospital, I talked with his son Gil. His parents loved each other very much, and I knew how hard this was for Shirley. Gil told me how his dad had put everything in order some months before his death. That in the safe deposit box, there was an envelope with all the instructions in it for Gil and his mother. How much that was like Vip…..what ever he did, he did well. Gil also spoke to me about his parents, saying that they had been married so long., and yet he felt there was the utmost respect between them. As I told Gil, that I have always felt that the length of a marriage is not always indicative of the strength of the marriage, but that I had found that with many marriages, what had certainly been passion in the beginning, very often turned into respect in the later years. Vip asked that he be cremated. He and Shirl planned for the family to retain his ashes, and when Shirley’s time came to join him, their ashes along with Vip’s West Point Ring, and Shirl’s miniature be buried together at West Point Rest in Peace Vip……we loved you and remember you and miss you. Phil and Yale Weatherby

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