| Name: | Amy Weston |
| Title: | friend |
| Entered: | 2006-10-18 17:56:30 |
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September, 2006, Jessica and I went to Italy together! For 10 glorious days we wandered all through Italy. We went to Venice, Ravenna, Florence, Perugia and Rome. We saw the canals of Venice and visited St. Mark's. St. Marks was the first of many churches we visited. In Florence, we admired the David at the Academia, Santa Maria Novella, visited San Marco, the church of the Annunziata (the gold church of Florence), the Uffizi Gallery, and we went to mass at the Duomo (Santa Maria del Fiore). Even though Mass was said in Italian, it was beautiful and we followed right along. In Rome, once again, our days were busy. Our hotel was directly across from the Trevi fountain. We also saw the Piazza Navonna, Colosseum, the Arch of Constantine, the Roman Forum, the Pantheon, Trajan's Column, Spanish Steps, Santa Maria Maggiore, the Vatican, and Basilica of St. Peter's. We got to see Pope Benedict XVI. We were near the front and had a fantastic view. The Pope blessed us, our children and our families, as well as the items we had with us. Both Jessica and I had seen Pope John Paul before he died, so it was incredibly special that we saw Pope Benedict together. Of course we ate and drank all along the way! The food and wine was wonderful. We even had gelato a couple of times! But one story I will always remember. On our last day, we were in Rome. We caught a taxi (and survived the ride) to Santa Maria Maggiore (the gold church of Rome) which is my favorite Basilicas in Rome. We wandered through the church and towards the end of our visit, we stopped in front of a statue of Mary. Jessica had sat on her walker, and a gentleman walking by noticed her shoes and made a comment to her about how comfortable they are. She was wearing her crocs that day. Jessica and he had a short, pleasant exchange about crocs. He sat down for a few minutes. When he got up to leave, he told Jessica that he prayed for her and bid her goodbye. I remembering thinking, "wow, that was really sweet, he didn't ask any questions or anything, but knew to pray for her." Well, once we finished visiting the church, we walked for a bit and then caught another taxi down to the Forum. We walked by the Forum, to the Colosseum and Arch of Constantine. A few hours later, we were both hungry and ready to eat. We decided to catch a taxi and return to the Piazza Navonna. Jessica just loved the area. Upon returning, I suggested that we eat at Tre Scalini's and told Jessica that it was my mom's favoriate restaurant in Rome. Well Tre Scalini has 2 areas, one more formal than the other. I told Jessica I wanted to eat at the more formal one. We were seated at a table outside and had a wonderful view of the piazza. As we were reading the menus, the waiter asked us what we were drinking and we told him we wanted vino rosso and vino bianco. When he returned with the wine, he told us it was compliments of the gentleman over there and pointed to a couple at another table. It was the guy from the church that was talking about crocs. What are the chances of running into the same person you've never met before in a city as large as Rome?!? It was fate. He came over and introduced himself and talked for a while.
It's good for the soul to know that there are loving, caring people all over the world!
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| Name: | Charles Basuino |
| Title: | Friend At RGA |
| Entered: | 2006-06-21 18:59:53 |
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To George and Emily,
I do not have a funny story about your mom, but I do want to let you know how smart you mom is and how dedicated she is to helping people that she works with.
There is a process that I have that had been taking very many hours and most times was very frustrating to handle. Your mom took the time to gather the information, analize it and then lay out a plan of action. She was able to create a simple routine that took the data that I sent, cutomised it and made the process run smoothly and quickly. This was about two years ago, and I still use it today.
I do periodically see your mom at work and feel very blessed that I am able to know such a person. I realize what she is living through and when my days get out of wack and feel that I am just up against a wall, I look at what your mom is accomplishing on a daily basis and then I realize that I need to live life like she is - caring for those around her.
I do ask your mom about both of you when I do get a chance to speak to her, and I realize how much she loves you both. You are very blessed to have such a mom.
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| Name: | Deborah (Wright) Diehl |
| Title: | Camp Guano |
| Entered: | 2005-06-08 18:23:58 |
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My name is Debbie. I met Jessica when she came to work at Healthcare Interchange, Inc. I have many fond memories of working with so many people at Healthcare Interchange, Inc., it was a great place to be in the 90's. My favorite story with Jessica involves Camp Guano. Camp Guano was a management retreat that took place over the course of almost a year. There were 2 teams and each team spends a couple weeks off in Licking MO for a week at each session doing various exercises and discussing many topics. Jessica was not in my group. The last week of the retreat, both teams joined together out in this small cabin/ we had people in tents and trailers and of course the cabin. It was very hot and we were all sweating. One exercise involved designing and building a deck in 24 hours, with no power tools, one trip into town for supplies and only 750.00 to spend. Well, looking back at photos, you will see everyone is dripping with sweat and looks like something from the swamp. Not Jessica! Jessica had on a cute little outfit, makeup, cute little shoes and not a hair out of place. And that is not to say that Jessica did not do her fair share! Jessica always did look good no matter what she was doing. The next day, we were doing a float trip. Jessica and I decided that we did not want to do Canoes, we wanted a raft. So we brought a raft since the place the company contracted with only did canoes. Now in order to get the full picture you have to have one of the details. Jessica is very slim and petite, I however, am not. I probably made up at least 2 1/2 Jessica's at the time. But God Bless her, she was very cool about the whole thing and said that she would partner with me. Well, we began the float and we didn't have enough air in the raft and kept trying to blow it up more. Needless to say, we fell hours behind and some of the other canoes had to come back and rescue us. Jessica never complained and made the day fun anyway. I remember thinking wow, she really is a nice person and I am so glad I got that day to get to know her! Beauty comes in many forms, some have both inner and outer beauty, that is Jessica!
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| Name: | Malinda |
| Title: | The Early Years |
| Entered: | 2005-05-19 03:31:04 |
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Where to start!!! I have so many memories of being the younger sister. I guess I will start with Jessica's love for playing school. We lived in Stillwater Oklahoma while our Dad was doing something (going to school I think), what did we care, we were 4/5 years old. We had this really cool play room and Jessica would only play school. AND, she would only allow herself to be the teacher. Well, that's not quite true, she let me once or twice for a cummulative of 5 mins! She would make me draw and take a nap. I might have even had a spelling test. This was mostly in the winter. In the summer I would hide from her in the big Mimosa tree in the front yard. Which reminds me of us "fishing" off the front porch and crawling in the windows when Dad re-finished the floors. Another day....
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| Name: | Rick Caminiti |
| Title: | Former RGA associate |
| Entered: | 2005-05-18 00:54:22 |
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Not to toot Jessica's horn, but [toot] [toot]! I don't really have any good stories, but I'm sure there are plenty. I used to sit by her at RGA, and we all used to share sorted stories from our cubes and on the way to the coffee pot.
Jessica is a beautiful person, and will always be that way in our hearts. She never seems to age, and she never seemed to gain an ounce when she had you two beautiful children.
This all however dwarfs how nice and sweet of a human being she is. I couldn't possibly say one bad word about Jessica, because there are none and if I did, she'd make be put a quarter in the cuss bucket.
I'm sure this WebSite will see her well for years and years and that you guys won't be reading this until she is 90. I'll bet she'll still look 29 then too.
Jessica, you are loved.
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