Today I am here at the end of a very long journey, today I am here to say good bye to Lisa Lynn Packard Beaudry. She finished her life as she lived her life, full of passion, love and exuberance.
She was my friend, confidant, co-worker and I would have it no other way. Lisa epitomized the phrase, ‘a friend doesn’t chastise you for being arrested, she says Wow, what a crazy night!’
Lisa was a funny, talented, fun loving person. She was also one of the most caring individuals that I have ever met. She was truly there for those she loved and once you were in her circle, you were in.
Lisa was there for so many people, she spent her money on those that were needy, she would give money to the panhandlers, to the neighborhood kids and she forgave anyone for making a mistake that they were too ignorant to understand the outcome. But, she would always hold you accountable for your mistakes.
I have never met a more passionate person. She loved and loved deeply, she worked hard at everything she did and she worked hard for those she loved. She had a favorite quote that she often thought of, it is from Wayne Gretzsky, “=="The highest compliment that you can pay me is to say that I work hard every day, that I never dog it."
She started her life the young baby girl of a race car driver who adored her for the short eleven months that he was alive. That made trouble for each and every man that followed him as she would measure them all to that short eleven months of being the apple of a man’s eye.
Due to her fathers occupation as a race car driver she grew up in race tracks and her love of racing, especially the sprints on a high banked dirt track, never waned. She fancied herself to be a race car driver of sorts and if fate had granted a different twist, I wouldn’t have been surprised to see her racing sprints, stocks and Indy cars herself. She enjoyed a good race until the day she died and I am sure that she has made arrangements to see a few more in the next life.
Lisa’s love of racing came from a true competitive spirit and it was this competitiveness that fueled much of her life.
There was one man after Lisa’s father that she was crazy about; Matt Beaudry, she nicknamed him ‘Bo’, after a playful turn of events concerning the girl that introduced them.
They would make their family shake their heads in wonder as it was obvious when ever they were together that the deep love they shared. They just never seemed to live together in peace.
Lisa and Bo had six children and together they raised them in love and respect. That was what made Lisa different from the huge majority of mothers in the world. She had a profound respect for her children. She treated her children as she would have wanted to be treated. She adored her children and grandbabies and loved to be called gg.
Lisa was a different kind of gg, no knitting or baking for her, in her later years she enjoyed taking her grandbabies with her on trips and vacations. She loved to engage her family in long intelligent conversations and she expected her girls and grandbaby girls to be smart and intelligent and well read. Lisa involved all of her family in her life and her doings.
As her youngest child ‘Tuffy’ was growing up she began her career with hockey. She got started managing hockey teams to help out Bo, but was quickly drawn in to the rough and graceful sport. Lisa immensely enjoyed the time that she and Bo worked hard and started and developed the team at Utah Valley University. She was forever proud of her time as a Wolverine.
Lisa didn’t stop there with hockey, she went on to be a consultant to many college and minor league teams and was grateful for very minute.
Here are a just a few of Lisa’s lifelong accomplishments;
a. She was an Olympic level archer, at one time won a contest against the archer, Daryyl Pace who went on to win a gold medal in the Olympics.
b. Even though she had originally flunked out of high school as a junior, she was able to attend day high school and night high school (full time at each) to earn her high school diploma with her graduating class.
c. She enlisted in the Marine Corps.
d. She scored a prefect score on the ASVAB, the entrance exam for the Armed Services. Because of this she was able to graduate boot camp as a Private First Class, instead of just a Private.
e. She graduated Marine Corps Boot camp. She would say about herself - ‘not so lean, not so mean, but always proud to be a Marine.’ After boot camp she was M-16 qualified as a ‘Marksman”
f. Started a small business of selling Avon cosmetics and became a state leading sales rep and promoted to a regional sales supervisor.
g. Started another small business in the printing industry and had sales in the first year of nearly two –hundred fifty thousand.
h. Started another small business of in home lingerie sales and became a state sales leader, and was promoted to a supervisor and won two trips for her and Bo, one to Rio de Janiero and the other to Hawaii.
i. Lisa realized, accepted and started the process to overcome her deep fear of birth, realizing enough knowledge, strength and courage to progress to having 3 children at home, the last of which was an 11 pound surprise breech birth.
j. She successfully navigated and managed a family while her husband went through three years of unemployment and retraining from his printing services career to a firefighting/paramedic services career.
k. She maintained a working farm with 5 kids, 2 cows, 1 horse, 4 pigs, 4 sheep, 10-15 goats, 50 chickens, 6 ducks, 20 rabbits, 3 dogs, 3 cats, etc, all while her husband was away at fire school in Denver 3 hours away and only allowed to come home on most, not all, weekends. This was for the Period from Jan 20th – May 30th. At this time she also became pregnant with Winter.
l. Lisa moved her family across country three times.
m. She routinely canned 500 quarts of food for her family each fall.
n. She started another small business in Provo of two shaved ice stands, Lisa’s Snow Shack, that employees family and brings in a extra three to four thousand a summer.
o. She enrolled in her first semester at UVSC as a full-time student for Spring 08 and earned a 3.9 gpa.
p. Lisa kept a youthful/healthy appearance and attitude her entire life.
Lisa finished her Doctorate when she was 57 years old. She taught college students for much of the rest of her life. Her favorite classes to teach were ones that caused her students to think about, learn from and better their own lives.
I know that my life is certainly better for having known her.
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