Gratitude: Aubrey, Her Namesake...

In October 2009, my company hosted a open house and ceremony for a new field office in our area.  I had done very little in the way of planning this event.  These sorts of things were handled out of our home office in Oklahoma.  My job was largely to be our CEO's assistant for the day.  I had worked for him for almost four years while Chris was in grad school so being his assistant was kinda second nature.

Plus Super Woman Linda was just a phone call or email away.

I will never forget that day.

I was pregnant with my miracle daughter.  Although, we didn't know Baby E was a girl yet.  My mom had come to town a couple of weeks earlier and we'd gone maternity clothes shopping.  That was surreal in and of itself.  I'd bought a precious little black dress then with plans to wear it for just these types of event.

Let's just be honest here and say, I was adorable.

The amount of work it took for our CEO to come to town for a visit was...well, epic.

There was an event we hosted for our vendors.  A heavy hors d'oevres reception and our CEO, Aubrey, was the featured speaker.  Several other executives were in town too but he was the star.  The lobby was crammed with people.  Wall to wall.  The parking lot was completely full.  I'd been coordinating Aubrey's arrival with all "his people" and we thought we were totally on top of it.

Until I looked outside and saw him walking up to the building.

All by himself.

Apparently, he'd also noticed the parking lot was completely full and took it upon himself to find a spot across the street and simply walk over.   You know, instead of using the front and center parking spot we'd been saving for him.

His people and I were not at all surprised.

Like always, he'd chosen "Secret Option D."  Which was a joke amongst all of us doing our darnest to keep up with the man.  We'd give him three options.  Do you want to do A, B or C?  And inevitably, he'd select "secret option D."

We could never out think him.

I met Aubrey during my second interview for the position of Executive Assistant in his office.  I'd interviewed with Linda first and wowing him was the second hurdle.  We'd had to reschedule the interview once and, I later heard, we'd almost had to reschedule it again but, thankfully for me, the Duke basketball team lost the night before.  He interviewed me by shooting questions out in rapid fire.  Kinda like I was the hoop and he was ALL THE PLAYERS on a basketball team.  I remember barely having time to think.  

And he asked me the most memorable interview question ever...

"What is it you love about your husband?"

(In his defense, I believe I mentioned I was married and I kinda liked my husband a lot and we were totally in love with OKC.  So I opened the door.  He walked right on through it.)

"He makes me laugh."

Laughing..."That's a good thing.  Laughter.  It's a good thing."

And I got the job.

Through the years, I had the honor of watching Aubrey work.  He was a true visionary.  A gentle man who could command with a voice just above a whisper.  But he was equally as strong and powerful.  He loved to work and loved to play with equal gusto.  An avid collector both of things and people, the same friends he had as a kid, he kept as an adult.  We each loved The Beatles and college football.  Although, he had a hard time with Auburn being the Tigers and yelling War Eagle.  But truth be told, even us Auburn folk admit that is kinda weird.  We were in complete agreement on the majesty of OU, however.

He fiercely loved his wife, Katie.  They had frequent date nights.  Katie would come to pick him up from the office dressed in her little black dress and pearls.  His face lit up when he talked about her or when she called to check in.  He went to boy scout meetings with his sons.  Took road trips with the kids.  Cared for his precious parents like they were absolute treasures to him.  

In 2007, Chris took a job away from Oklahoma.  In Texas.  We'd done our best to stay but this was the path God put us on.  In Texas.  Sometimes God really confuses me.

(Y'all know I'm kidding.)

(Boomer Sooner!)

(So only kinda kidding.)

My last night in that office before transferring down to Texas, I stayed long after everyone else in the building had left.  I couldn't seem to leave and yet, I was ready.  We were trying to grow our family and I knew the move was necessary.  The hours needed to work for executives and their families are long and hard and intense.  Although, we laughed oh so much and the work was immensely fulfilling.  

But I still couldn't imagine leaving this work family.  That's what they had become.  My family.  Assistants and executives alike.  I was proud to serve them and alongside them.  I would have done anything for them and their families.  And I genuinely believe the feeling was mutual.  

There I stood.  Two years and one month later.  In my pretty black maternity dress.  Finally growing the family we had been praying for since before I shut down the office in Oklahoma that night.

So much had happened in those two years and one month.  Surgery.  An IUI that I thought was going to kill me.  IVF 0.5 cancelled thanks to cyst growth.  IVF 1.5 resulted in four embabies but no pregnancy.  And IVF 2.5 added six more embabies and one very ambitious (Read:  STUBBORN) embryo who decided to stick around for the long haul.  

Through most of that, Aubrey had followed along.  

Somewhere around the first year after I'd transferred, he had asked my boss if she knew anything about me and possible babies.  He'd known before we moved that we were ready to grow our family.  The fact he'd remembered that and then asked about it was not at all unlike him.  He had an amazing memory and he was incredibly loyal.  I'd earned his trust and loyalty with my dedication and hard work.  He hadn't forgotten that.

He'd asked my boss about the costs of the infertility treatments and commented something to the effect of, "well, insurance covers that, right?"  To which she responded, "No, Aubrey.  Our insurance does not cover that."

"Really?"

And now his eyes were open.

Later that night, he called me.  Not even once did my caller ID pop up with his number and my heart not begin to immediately race.  He confessed he'd asked my boss about our troubles having children.  He asked to be kept in the loop on what we were doing with treatments.  I was beyond touched.  

With each step, each failed IVF attempt, I emailed him with the details.  Not with every single doctor's appointment.  Because that would be insane.  He did have a company to run and stuff.  But with most major events.  Including the costs of all those treatments.  He always thanked me for letting him know, asked a rather appropriate question (I was always amazed at his ability to ask the exact. right. question) and said to let him know about the next step.  He'd copy Katie on each response back to me.  

It was almost a full year from his call to being given the honor and joy of sharing my pregnancy news with him.  He was overjoyed, as was Katie and my entire work family.

A few days prior to that open house in 2009, our company had released the new insurance information for the upcoming year.  Included, for the first time ever, was infertility insurance and adoption assistance.  I remember sitting at my desk crying.  
I finally got Aubrey alone for just one minute that day of the open house.  I had been planning for this moment ever since I sat at my desk reading about the insurance.  Heart racing and dangerously close to crying, I started...

"Aubrey, thank you for the infertility insurance.  We might be able to have another child thanks to that help."

And I will never, ever forget his words back.

"Oh yeah!  That's because of you!  I had no idea how much that stuff cost until you.  Good!"

By far, it was one of the most humbling moments of my life.  I had done nothing different than millions of other women do every day in pursuit of growing their family.  The difference had been our leader. Aubrey took notice of a personal struggle one of his thousands of employees was going through.  Examined his company policies.  And made a change.  A change offered to what was then over 10,000 employees and their families.  

In 2013, Aubrey left the company he co-founded.  I had left in 2011, after seven years.  When he left, the new CEO kept the infertility insurance in place.  My understanding from friends still there is the new CEO had also faced infertility.  He has triplets.  

My, how beautiful God makes our ashes.

We had joked over the year of Aubrey's involvement in our infertility journey that we should name a little girl, Aubrey Kate, after he and Katie.  That day in October of 2009, when he gave me such a gift of acknowledging how our struggles had changed a corporate policy, the joke ended.  We knew, if Baby E were a girl, she would be, without a doubt, Aubrey Kate.  

And so she is.

We kept that a secret until she was born and we had completed her birth certificate.  That's what you do when you're naming your child after your company's CEO and his wife.  You just don't tell them until it's done.  I didn't want to argue the point or give them a chance to insist otherwise.  We wanted to honor them in the role they played in what we believe was God's plan to help create families.  

They were nothing but gracious and humble in their response to her name.

Aubrey Kate's life is a testimony of how God works through us.  We had to go through those three years of infertility so Aubrey would put the insurance into place.  And one day in heaven, God is gonna introduce us to all the families He put together through that one thing.  

It was worth it.  All of it.

This week, Aubrey died in a car wreck.

We are completely stunned.  Both our little family and my work family.  

Over the years I worked directly for him and then after I'd transferred down here, I'd kept a file.  It was tiny.  Skinny.  But highly treasured.  Inside, it held personal notes from Aubrey, pictures from various events and maybe some emails.  These were the allcolades and praises he'd written to me or about me. 

I still have that file.

The night of his death, after I'd spent hours pouring over every detail on the internet and talking with my work family several times, I dug the file out.  I felt almost like I was an archeologist sorting through delicate documents.  I should have been wearing gloves.  Handling them with the utmost care.  These would forever be the only notes I will have from him.  

I've had wonderful conversations with my work family.  Long walks down memory lane.  Laughing over our life with Aubrey.  Equally laughing over others' experiences with him.  One person called him "Breezy."  There was nothing breezy about the Aubrey I knew.  He was intentional.  An annointed visionary.  A generous caretaker of us and our families.  Days with him could be much more tornado-like than breezy.  A single hour of him could create enough work and energy and dismay that we would spend days just trying to put ourselves back together.  

We cherished the occasional Christmas office lunch with him.  Where, undoubtedly, he would shoot those rapid fire basketball questions up to each of us and we just prayed we survived the hour.  But at the end of it, we were revived, energized and engaged.  We knew we had been given both a rare privilege to hear from a truly great man and accept his invitation to join him on the journey. 

On the Friday afternoons when he was in the office, he loved to hunker down and be alone with his music and his windows open.  Sure, that Oklahoma wind blew papers around his office but he didn't care.  It was too nice of a day to be cooped up entirely.  And on those days, we'd get the emails reading, "I've got Spring Fever.  Do you?  Get out of here early and enjoy the weekend!"

And we would all run like the building was on fire to enjoy those hours of freedom!  Because Saturday was comin' and so was the work.

Truly, I have never met another person like him in my entire life.

And I believe I never will.

When people ask us about our daughter's name, and they do because having two names is not entirely common out here in Texas, we absolutely adore telling her story.  A story that includes a great man and his amazing wife.  A story of a leader honoring his employees and their struggles.  A story of a visionary who saw no reason why his company couldn't meet the needs of it's employees.  

No matter how the story of his life ended this week, his legacy is far greater than that one moment.  Our daughter, our family, is a testament to that legacy.  

And as people continue to ask, why Aubrey Kate?  Know they should be prepared to sit a spell while I tell the story of an amazing man and how God puts people and struggles and futures and generous hearts together and makes something truly extraordinarily beautiful.

Thank you, Aubrey.  We are forever grateful to have you as part of our family story and to be able to share your legacy for generations to come.