.png)
My beloved Joe made no apologies for the choices he made in his life. I laughed at some of the ridiculousness that ensued downstairs in our living room as his life-long partner, and as his wife. The silly dances and random songs he would sing around the house. He always made me laugh, and I genuinely believe he enjoyed being on the other end of it. He would make some amazing dishes in the kitchen after I'd beg him to show me how to make his famous oatmeal honey soap. The value of those moments wasn't something he was cornered into reflecting on, nor was it something I could anticipate the magnitude of at the time. He was just his authentic self. He'd go in the garage on the weekends and sometimes weekday after work, and he would just build things and work on his plane until there was no sunlight left to work under. Joe loved what he loved. He'd run around the ottoman with our blue-nosed pit / fur baby Powder, and just magnify the joy and foolishness of having an animal in the home. Joe had a self built plywood boat in our garage that he infamously named Lil' Yachty, after he took a hilarious interest in the Sprite commercial with hip hop artist Lil' Yachty repeatedly saying "I like Sprite soda, I like Sprite soda." Infinitesimal moments like that trump the world trips we took annually believe it or not. We went to Italy, Greece, Canada, Japan, S. Africa, and Mexico. (For some reason, Joe couldn't stand Jamaica) They trump these bucket list inspired, life-changing, once in a lifetime trips, because they were completely impromptu. They weren't planned, they weren't discussed, they were simply randomly showcased.
That in a nutshell was my Joe. At the time, a lot of close acquaintances didn't know, but Joe had skin cancer. He had it while building his Whitman Tailwind W10 experimental aircraft, while traveling the world with me, while showing me how to make artisan soap in our kitchen, while managing a team on the eastern seaboard for AT&T, and while going HAM in our house for all of these walls to see. It metastasized into non-hodkin's lymphoma. Even though it came and left for 20yrs. When it decided it was time to come back and resurface, it came back with an intention that no one who knew or loved Joe would agree with. He knew he had to make the best of this time left here. He knew exactly how he intended to live his life and how he wanted it to be done. I'm loaded with inspiration from that, but put plainly I'm proud of my hubby. The original co-founder of Joe-Le Soap was a badass. He left us on Jan 13, 2022. But his legacy is right here.
So my question to you is simple. How would you live your life if you knew when your time was coming to an end? Come on, it's no Illuminati encrypted secret that our time here on earth has an expiration stamp. So what now? What are you going to do with your life this year in 2023?
Rest in Peace my love...
Joseph D. Handsome PhD
Dec 31, 1974 - Jan 13, 2022
