Newspaper Page Text
Page 4B - The Lee County Ledger, Thursday, October 4,2001
COUNTY
INVITATION TO BID
PARTIAL RENOVATION OF
THE HISTORIC
LEE COUNTY COURTHOUSE
The Lee County Board of Commissioners is
accepting sealed written bids from profes
sional and qualified contractors to par
tially renovate the historic lee County
Courthouse in accordance with the con
struction plans and specifications pre
pared by Stantec Architecture Inc. This
partial renovation project generally con
sists of the following:
Building a ramp on the north side of the
building for handicap accessibility.
Converting the existing public restrooms
on the first floor into handicap acces
sible.
Building new public handicap acces
sible restrooms in the Magistrate Court
area.
Repointing the exterior bricks to avoid
water penetration.
Reglazing all windows.
Repainting the entire interior and exterior
paintable surfaces.
Removing the entire old jail area and
constructing anew first floor courtroom in
its place.
Upgrading the building to current life/
safety and fire codes.
Construction plans and specifications are
available at the lee County Clerk's Office,
104 leslie Highway, leesburg, Georgia
31 763 or by calling (229) 759-6000 Monday
through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. for a
deposit of $75.00 per set. The deposit is
fully refundable fo each responsive bidder
if returned in good condition. In addition,
the plans and specifications for fhis
project are also available in the Dodge
Room located at 1216 Dawson Road in
Albany (436-2458).
If you choose fo submit a written bid on
this project, your sealed bid must be
marked, "Sealed Bid - Courthouse Renova
tions" and delivered to the lee County
Clerk's Office at 104 leslie Highway,
leesburg, Georgia 31 763 no later than 4:00
p.m. on Tuesday, October 9, 2001. All bids
will be opened during a public bid open
ing at 4:05 p.m. on Tuesday, October 9,
2001 in the County Clerk's Office. You are
invited to attend this bid opening. No bids
shall be withdrawn for a period of 60 days
offer the bid opening.
There will be a pre-bid conference held
on Tuesday, September 25, 2001 at 2:00
p.m. in the second floor courtroom of the
Lee County Courthouse. Attendance at
this conference is MANDATORY for any
General Contractor intending to bid on
this project. Other interested parties may
attend if they so desire. The Owner and
Architect will be present to answer ques
tions that the bidders may have regarding
the contract documents, plans, and
specifications. Bids will not be accepted
from those General Contractors not repre
sented at the pre-bid conference.
Each bidder must include in their sealed
bid, a bid security in the amount of 5% of
fhe bid amount payable to the lee
County Board of Commissioners from a
company authorized to do business in the
state of Georgia. In addition, the success
ful bidder must submit a 100% perfor
mance bond and 100% payment bond.
The Board of Commissioners will consider
awarding the bid to the lowest responsible
bidder during the commission meeting of
Monday, October 15,2001 beginning at
6:00 p.m. The successful bidder will have
until March 31, 2002 to complete this
project or face $100 per calendar day in
liquidated damages. The terms and time
of payment will be monthly.
The Lee County Board of Commissioners
reserves the right to accept or reject any
or all bids received and/or disregard
informalities or irregularities in the bids
received.
9/13, 9/20, 9/27, and 10/4
The Lee County Ledger
Your Source of Local News
Bereaved Partners Left With
Hardest Question: Who Am I Now?
By Myra Christopher (KRT)
You think that their
dying is the worst
thing that could happen.
Then they stay dead.
“Distressed Haiku,” written
by Donald Hall shortly after the
death of his wife, poet Jane
Kenyon.
No one who knew Bonnie and
Bud Story was surprised when,
after Bud was diagnosed with
esophageal cancer in 1992,
Bonnie quit teaching and
dropped everything to devote all
of her energy to her husband's
care. After all, she had taken
care of Bud most of her life.
Their grandfathers had gone
to business school together and
had been friendly competitors in
the small town of Charleston,
Mo. Their mothers had been
pregnant at the same time and
had joked about which of them
would be born first. Bonnie
won, by four days.
They napped in the same crib.
Growing up. they played
together and were in the same
classes. They dated off and on
in high school and married
before they finished college,
settling in Charleston and
raising crops and four children.
For the 18 months that Bud
fought for his life, Bonnie did
what everyone knew she would.
Whether at home, at the Mayo
Clinic in Rochester, Minn., or at
an alternative cancer treatment
clinic in Mexico, she knew
exactly how to be Mrs. Albert
Loebe Story Jr. She learned
quickly how to be a caregiver
and an advocate for her hus
band.
After Bud died, she didn’t
take to her next role quite so
quickly.
“For a whole year all I wanted
to do was sleep and stare at the
television.” Bonnie said. “I
don’t even like television. I was
numb. I just didn’t know what
to do.
“I was so busy searching for
something — what to do, where
to go. For the first time in my
life I felt completely alone and
without direction — rudder
less.”
Members of their close-knit
community were stunned when
Bonnie not only didn’t go back
to teaching after Bud died, but
picked up and moved from
Charleston. First she moved to
Cape Girardeau, Mo., 40 miles
away, and then to Martha’s
Vineyard to work in a seaside
gift shop. “It was an attempt to
leave my hurt behind,” she said.
It turned out that when she
lost Bud, Bonnie had lost many
of her friends, too. Couples they
had been friends with for years
stopped calling, she said. She
thought people wanted to avoid
her.
“It was like my pain was too
much for them,” she said, “or
that maybe it was contagious.”
In her new surroundings.
Bonnie found new friends —
“divorcees and other women I
would never have been friends
with before.”
Bonnie’s experience isn’t out
of the ordinary for the 1 million
Americans who are widowed
each year — and those numbers
are growing fast, fueled by the
ubiquitous Baby Boomers. The
Social Security Administration
projects that by 2010, nearly
1,050,000 Americans will lose
spouses each year, and by 2030
that number is expected to grow
to more than 1.5 million. And
these figures don’t factor in
deaths of partners in committed
non-traditional relationships.
Those left behind face
redefining their lives to deal in
new ways with family and
friends, as well as unresolved
feelings and regrets left over
from marriage, according to Dr.
Morton Lieberman, director of
the Aging and Mental Health
Program at the University of
California at San Francisco, in
his book. “Doors Close, Doors
Open: Widows, Grieving and
Growing.”
A brochure provided by
AARP’s Grief and Loss
Program advises, “As time
progresses, you will feel less
intense pain, but you will not
forget. You will never be your
old self again (you have had a
major life change), but you can
be a different self who is
‘okay.'”
Statistically, the job of
rebuilding is left to wives.
Sixty-nine percent of people left
behind when a spouse dies are
women. And the numbers play
havoc with the image of the
City of Smithville
City of Smithville is accepting applications
for full time police officer.
Must be P.O.S.T. certified.
Contact Chief Causey at 846-2101 from
9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
ATTENTION
LEE COUNTY
CITIZENS
The gate across the road that used to go
to Burke’s Ferry has been removed by
temporary restraining order. This road
has been abandoned by the county for
almost 40 years. This is known by the
people who live in the area.
Anyone that is concerned about the
treatment of Lee County citizens and
taxpayers in this situation should contact
their commissioner and voice their opin
ion. What is happening to the landowner
in this situation can and may happen to
you!!!
Wake up Lee County and know the truth.
Paid for by Lee County citizens who
know that this has not been handled
fairly by our local government.
frail, elderly widow. According
to the National Vital Statistics
Report, there are currently
500,000 widows under the age
of 45 in the United States, many
with children, leading to more
complex issues.
Shellie Gill is one of them.
Shellie was only 36 when her
husband, Joe, died suddenly of
a rare strep infection in Febru
ary, leaving behind their
daughter, Madeline, 7, and 3-
year-old son, Stephen. A few
weeks after Joe's death, Shellie
described their children as “the
only bright spot... the reason I
make myself get up in the
morning; the reason I make
myself eat and dress and bathe.
It’s good that I have them.
“We balanced each other,”
Shellie said. “Joe brought
something to the kids that I
don’t think I can. I am the
serious one — ‘brush your
teeth, drink your milk’; he
brought them laughter and fun.
He made us a family.
“I know how to turn off the
water and light the pilot light,
but I don’t know how to
comfort Maddie when she says,
‘My Daddy will never see me in
braces.' Or what to say to
Stephen when he cries at night
and says, ‘But my Daddy wants
to come home.’”
At night when the children go
to sleep, Shellie faces her own
grief.
She desperately misses the
way “Joe felt — his eyebrows
and his hands.” A few weeks
after Joe’s death. Shellie found
a tape recording of Joe and
Stephen singing “Tomorrow”
from the musical “Annie.” “I
just lost it,” she said.
Because Joe's death is so
recent, Shellie is just beginning
to reach out for help. “I realize I
need help and want all of it I
can get,” she said, so she is
seeing a professional counselor
and takes the kids to Solace
House, a grief and bereavement
program for children and their
families in Kansas City, Mo.
Older widows with little
education or financial means
sometimes surprise themselves
and everyone around them by
bucking the odds and starting
over.
Six years ago, when Teresa
Serda lost her husband of 42
years, their 16 children were
grown, and she was a long way
from Mexico, where she had
grown up “very, very poor.”
When they married, he was
widowed and had six children.
She was only 21.
Teresa knew that she would
have to support herself when
her husband died and that it
would not be easy. She had no
formal education and couldn't
drive or read. So her dying
husband was surprised when
she told him she planned to get
a job, and didn't want “to cook
or to clean.”
It was a bold idea for a
woman who had never gone to
the grocery store without her
husband. But within a year she
was true to her word. Teresa
now works at a community
center that provides social
services to Spanish-speaking
people. She lives alone with her
dog, Maggie, and her parakeet,
Charlie.
“I started working and
working every day. And my son
can't believe it that I work. He
said, ‘Oh, Mom, why do you
work?’ I use him for my ride
and sometimes I don’t have a
ride and I pay a cab. ... If I am
not sick, I’m here every day ...
and. you know, my life gets
better and better and better.”
One of her daughters recently
gave her the highest praise: “I
think Dad is proud of you.”
Men who are widowed face a
different set of stresses, proven
by their death rate, which is
three times higher than that for
women in the same circum
stances, according to the AARR
Typically, men have two
things working against healing:
They don’t expect to live longer
than their wives, and their
socialization and training tell
them that they should be strong
and silent. Often they have lost
the only person in the world to
whom they are comfortable
confiding their feelings at a
time when it is critically
important to have someone to
talk to.
When Michael Goshorn’s wife
was diagnosed with cancer in
late 1992, the couple found
plenty of information online
about her disease and support
groups. So, when she died in
January 1993, he turned to the
Web again, but this time he
didn't find what he needed —
information that addressed
specific issues about widow
hood for men.
When he couldn't find the
resources he needed, he created
them in the form of
www.WidowNet.org, a compre
hensive site that provides
practical information and self-
help. The site includes a
message board and sections
with titles like “Dumb Remarks
and Stupid Questions” and
“Getting Through the Holi
days,” as well as links to help
men grapple with their new
identities.
Building a new life or finding
new meaning sometimes
requires just taking another
approach to your “old” life.
After Bonnie Story moved
from Charleston, she got help
from a professional counselor
who helped her deal with
intense feelings of anger, a
feeling many widows say takes
control of their lives.
“I wasn’t angry at God, and I
certainly wasn’t angry at Bud,”
she said. “I was just angry —
angry at everyone and about
everything.”
The counselor helped her to
realize that her feelings
“weren't weird, that I wasn’t
going crazy.”
Counseling and reading gave
Bonnie some ideas about how
to find her new self: Bonnie
without Bud.
Bonnie began to realize that
“you have to find some major
reason you are still here.” She
found that reason in the life she
had lived before Bud died.
Two years ago, Bonnie moved
back to Charleston and started
teaching again. “To impact the
lives of thirteen or fourteen kids
each year — that's important
enough.” Recently, she had a
two-hour lunch with a friend
from whom she had felt
estranged since Bud died. She
now believes they will build a
new friendship.
“I know that I will never get
over my loss,” Bonnie said.
“But I've found ease in my
heart and freedom in my life.”
Myra Christopher is president
and chief executive officer of
Midwest Bioethics Center in
Kansas City, Mo.
For more resources and
contacts on end-of-life issues,
go to www.findingourway.net
LCMS Teacher Feature
Leslie Reese is a seventh and
eighth grade teacher at Lee
County Middle School. She has
three years of teaching experi
ence, all of which has been in Lee
County. This her first year of
teaching at Lee County Middle
School.
Mrs. Reese has a Bachelor of
Science Degree in Special Edu
cation - Intellectual Disabilities
from Georgia Southwestern State
University. Leslie Reese and her
husband, Dean, reside in Albany.
Mrs. Reese’s hobby is finding
bargains on e-bay. In her spare
time, she likes to go shopping and
be with family and friends.