When meeting Robert “Bob” Johnson for the first time, you will find him to be a great conversationalist and a good storyteller. Bob is also in the beginning stages of Parkinson’s disease. He knows that he needs to move out of his current home because soon the ability to adequately maintain his home will be gone. Bob also is aware that he is in need of quality in-home health care, or as Bob prefers to say “home helpers”. This is where Wesley Homes Home Health entered the picture. Bob and his wife, Jessie, tried three home care services before selecting Wesley Homes in January 2013. Home helper Renee Nafziger provides housework and occasional meal preparation for Bob, and Bob has found Renee to be highly energetic and intuitive. Renee also provides Bob with companionship. “She has been a great help in keeping Bob on track and listening to his stories,” said Jessie. “She has the personality to help him without him knowing he is being guided.” In order to move, Bob needs to consolidate and organize his belongings. He has thousands of pictures that he wants to digitize and organize before he packs. Renee has been indispensable in assisting Bob with the digitizing project, which includes digitizing all the photos and negatives, matching them up to his stories and determining which photos and negatives to keep on hand. Renee feels that she knows the entire family because she has seen pictures of almost all of the family members and has heard Bob’s stories. “I’ve learned about the grandkids from the time they were born, as well as the adult children since they were in their late teens,” said Renee. Jessie feels the most important thing is that the older adults have great stories and pictures. Photos remind them of different events in their lives. Bob has been a major part of the Auburn community. He was an Auburn fire chief for 22 years and was the 2013 grand marshal for the Auburn Days Grand Parade. He is a member of the Auburn Noon Lions, enjoys being Santa’s helper for special circumstance children, was president of the Emergency Management team and was director of Emergency Management for Auburn. Bob and Jessie were married in 1995 and have a total of four children and 13 grandchildren. Bob’s next phase of life is moving to an assisted living community in Bellingham, WA, where he and Jessie have family. He looks forward to watching the snow fall and the magnificent sunsets outside his window. Jessie agrees. “I told Bob that I gave him 22 years in the valley and no sunsets, so he is going to spend the rest of our time in Bellingham where I can see sunsets.”
