Tom Wolf's Retirement Quilt

When you work with someone for twenty years and out of the blue they come into your office, shut your door, and tell you that they would like to talk to you for a few minutes.... you wonder what it is about.. in my wildest dreams did I think that Tom would come into my office and tell me that he was going to be retiring at the end of August. As I heard those words my heart dropped to the floor and tears came into my eyes as Tom was not suppose to be the first one to retire from R&G. I have the most utterly respect for Tom. I can not count the times that I have went into his office and cried on his shoulder and he would talk me through what was going on in my life and assure me that everything would be ok. When Rhett's father passed away and I was in Colorado dealing with funeral homes, life insurance company and attorney's it was Tom that I called in a state of shock with all that was going down... and I remember Tom telling "Allisyn, you are going to be ok, you don't have to sign anything right now and don't let them push you around", (Tom was really the second call I made.. the first call was to my Dad) but most of all I was thankful that I knew that Tom would help me with anything that I need done legally during this dark spot in my life. To say that I will miss Tom is a understatement.. I will really MISS Tom, I will miss talking about huckleberry picking, talking about Priest Lake, talking about nothing at all... I will miss his good morning HI Al's, I will just miss Tom. I know sometimes I go on and on without really saying anything. After Tom left my office I knew that I wanted to make him a quilt, a quilt for his cabin a quilt that had deers, bears, elks, wolves, trees, fall colors so the hunt was on, and most of the time when I am making a quilt it takes me awhile to gather all my fabric but knowing that I had very little time I had to go for it. One never knows when giving someone a quilt what they are going to think or how they will react. So I take the quilt to the office and after making sure that Tom was out of his office I went and put the quilt on his chair with a card then went back to work... When I saw Tom walk in the office my hands started to sweat.. After a few minutes I had to go into one of the other offices when Tom came walking the hall down put his arm around me and said "We need to talk about what is in my office" So we walked down to his office where he told me the quilt was so beautiful and that he could not believe that I made him a quilt. I told Tom that I may suck at transcribing your tapes but I can make quilts.. Over and over again he told me how much he loved it and that he was going to hang it in his cabin..I would not call it a beautiful quilt, I would just call it Tom's cabin quilt. I will miss Tom!!!