For Odd Fellow Friends and Battle Buddies: Remembering Sandy Pinkard
I first shared Sandy’s story in October 2011. Today, I’m revisiting it in his memory.
You never know when someone ventures across your path whether it will be for a moment, a season, or a lifetime. I know that each relationship changes us somehow, builds character through our differences, or perhaps nourishes our soul.
Sandy Pinkard certainly changed ours.
Sandy was a proud veteran, a country songwriter, and my incidental friend. He arrived at Shepherd’s Pasture in East Texas with his dog, Gracie, after a roller coaster ride of a life.
He said he was “looking for a good place to die.”
Why here? Just because it was the right place at the right time, I guess. Not because he had ever met us—or even particularly wanted to be here, I would guess.
What followed was a few precious, hard years and an odd-fellow relationship that became part of our family’s story and the story of United We Serve.
An Intermission Celebration at Shepherd’s Pasture
When I first wrote this story on October 18, 2011, Sandy was leaving Shepherd’s Pasture for his next chapter.
“Not to worry,” I wrote then. “This is not a memorial kind of homage, more of an intermission celebration of a life that has a few more chapters to be written.”
And what a life he had already lived.
The kind of life full of more country legends and infamous mischief than you or I could even dream up. And all of that debauchery would stew in that timeless vault of a brain until it had aged to perfection and found just the right occasion to spill out in a wonderful tale.
Sandy had spent years on the road. His songwriting was part of his remarkable story. But at Shepherd’s Pasture, we also got to know his quirks, his humor, and the personality behind those stories.
Mother Superior, Hitler, and Drill SGT
I drove him to distraction at times.
This was verified by the collection of names I accrued over the years: Mother Superior, Hitler, Drill SGT.
By the time I wrote that original farewell, I realized I hadn’t heard any of those names for quite a while.
He had either given up the battle of the wills or realized that it was all tough love and for his own good.
Or maybe we had mellowed him just a little bit.
That was our friendship. Sometimes challenging, often funny, and precious to me.
A Proud Veteran and a Forever Battle Buddy
Sandy’s military service was part of who he was. He was a proud veteran, and remembering him belongs here among the field stories of United We Serve.
Our ministry serves veterans, military families, and our local community through the love of Christ. Over the years, that calling has brought people across our path whom we could never have known to look for.
Sandy was one of them.
His time with us was a relationship lived out over years, with all the differences, stubbornness, laughter, and care that can come with sharing life.
When he left, I wrote:
“We’ll all miss you Sandy, quirks and all. You have changed the landscape of life as we know it.”
He had. And he still holds a place in that landscape.
More Chapters Were Written
There were more chapters after Shepherd’s Pasture. Sandy later married, and his life continued beyond the season we shared.
Sandy has since passed away. So today, this story carries a remembrance that it did not carry when I first wrote it.
I look back with gratitude for the years we had, for the stories, and even for those battles of the wills.
He came here saying he was looking for a good place to die. I am grateful that there was more life ahead of him—and that we got to share part of it.
Making Room for the People God Brings Across Our Path
Shepherd’s Pasture Retreat Center in Jefferson, Texas, is home to United We Serve. Our mission is to share and multiply the unconditional love of Christ to our military, our local community, and our world.
Stories like Sandy’s remind me how personally that mission unfolds.
Sometimes it begins with someone arriving unexpectedly. Sometimes it takes years to understand what that relationship has meant. And sometimes a person leaves you with a collection of nicknames and memories that still make you smile.
I ended the original story by saying that you don’t choose family or battle buddies—and that we would forever be just that.
I still mean it.
Godspeed, Sandy. Thank you for being part of our crazy, amazing life.
—Romey Kilgore, Founder and CEO, United We Serve
To learn more about United We Serve’s ministry to veterans, military families, and our community—or to help sustain this work—explore our ministry and giving opportunities at unitedweservemil.org.
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