Gaylord Community Funeral Home & Cremation Service

12/21/2025

🎯

12/21/2025

Some of the bravest parents I know are doing this right now.

They’re hanging stockings for one child
while grieving another.

They’re wrapping gifts with shaking hands.
Showing up with broken hearts.
Holding joy and grief in the same breath.

If this is you, hear this clearly
you are not broken.
You are not ungrateful.
You are loving with a heart that has survived the unthinkable.

This season is heavy for grieving parents.
Presence and absence live side by side here.

If this found you, you are not alone ♥️

Author unknown

12/19/2025

The Ga***rd High School Medical Occupations class give students the chance to explore real-world careers through hands-on experiences.

Students have come in to meet with Joe and Rachel, ask questions, and learn about the profession.

One former student, Jayda, discovered some interest during the class this past year, and now works at the funeral home a few days a week.

Recently, Rachel and Jayda visited Mrs. Harts’ Medical Occupations class to share their experiences with the current students.

We have enjoyed the opportunity collaborating with Mrs. Hart to help students explore future career paths!

12/17/2025

12/17/2025

Jill A. Jenkins

View Jill A. Jenkins's obituary, find service dates, and sign the guestbook.

12/17/2025

Diane S. Livingston

View Diane S. Livingston's obituary, find service dates, and sign the guestbook.

12/17/2025

Donna L. Seamon

View Donna L. Seamon's obituary, send flowers, find service dates, and sign the guestbook.

12/17/2025

Ann E. Kureth

View Ann Elizabeth Kureth's obituary, send flowers, find service dates, and sign the guestbook.

12/16/2025

Long grief isn’t a season.
It’s permanent.
It stays with you. It settles in.

You learn how to keep living, but it’s never the same life.
There’s the one you had before and the one that came after.
You don’t go back. You just learn how to exist inside the after.

You stop expecting normal to return.
You start seeing that this is normal now.
You can have a good day and still feel the emptiness sitting right beside it.
You can be surrounded by people and still feel alone in a way you can’t explain.

You rebuild. You laugh. You find new pieces of life, but nothing feels untouched by loss.
It changes how you think, how you trust, how you hope.
Even joy feels different — smaller, quieter, earned.

Long grief is a slow acceptance that this is it.
There isn’t a finish line.
It’s the knowing that you’ll always love them, always miss them, and that both can exist inside the life you’re now living.

That’s what long grief is —
a lifetime of figuring out how to live with a wound that will never heal.

12/16/2025

Nicely done, Ryan!

🇺🇸 🪦 ❄️

12/15/2025

Some helpful suggestions for this time of year ~

12/14/2025

It’s OK if you’re feeling this way - 🥺😞

It’s December.
The world celebrates.
I grieve.

That’s the whole collision.

Nothing about this month meets me where I am.
It just keeps asking for cheer I don’t have.

There are invitations I won’t answer.
Songs I’ll turn off.
Days I’ll just get through.

I’m not bitter.
I’m bereaved.

If you’re walking into December with a loved ones absence,
you don’t need to explain yourself.

And if you’re standing next to someone like me this month, don’t try to fix it.

Just stay.

That matters more than anything.