Wilma Belle Bullion

Wilma Bullion died peacefully and without suffering or remorse in Gainesville, Texas, on March 20, 2016. Her passing was not unexpected by her family; she had been ill with Alzheimer’s for some time. She was almost 93 years old. Still, it was a wrench to those who loved her and grieve over the absence of the woman they called “Ma.”

Wilma was born on May 26, 1923 in Durant, Oklahoma. She was the youngest child of C. H. and Rosa Strawn Smithson. Her parents and her three sisters and brother pre-deceased her. After graduating from high school in Whitesboro, Texas, in 1939, she married Frank Trubenbach, Jr., of Muenster, Texas, in 1940. In 1942, their daughter Marilyn was born.

As was often the case during the era of the Second World War, the marriage of Wilma and Frank ended. She worked for over a decade as a legal secretary in Dallas while raising Marilyn. Thus she became a single mother before the category and its unique challenges and rewards became common and well-known.

During this time she met J Waddy Bullion, a Dallas attorney. They married in 1967. This marriage of sharp minds and strong wills lasted until Waddy’s death in 2004. What bound them together was a mutual respect for each other’s intelligence and character, a shared and abiding Christian faith, and a deep and enduring love. Wilma and Waddy built upon the strong foundations of their strengths as individuals and a couple, and while aware of each other’s weaknesses, forgave completely and struggled constantly to improve.

Throughout these years, Wilma worked unstintingly to mesh her family and Waddy’s together into one seamless whole. It was far from easy, but she succeeded. We all learned to appreciate her patience, her wisdom, her keen sense of the comedic absurdities of life, and her fierce defense of those who were hers when trouble and tragedy struck. And it was impossible not to be warmed by her love of her grandchildren and her great grandchildren. She guided them lovingly and carefully. She schooled them in new words, taught them to appreciate their blessings, and urged them to be mindful of the needs of others.

She is mourned by those who survive her: her daughter Marilyn and her husband Cal Koontz of Gainesville, Texas; her stepson John and his wife Laura of Columbia, Missouri; her stepdaughter Ann of The Woodlands, Texas; six grandchildren, Angie Russell and Kevin Koontz, Jack and Chandler Bullion, and Jenna Hendon and Matthew Mears; and ten great grandchildren. All of us have led very different lives, worked at a variety of jobs, and found ourselves in places far from familiar. But we always knew where home was. Where Ma was, there home was.

Wilma’s Southern Baptist doubts about sainthood have not kept her family from regarding her as a true saint of God. She called to our minds the “The Saints of God,” a hymn that rings out wherever Anglicans worship on All Saints Day. It identifies saints as “patient, and brave, and true.” More important, the hymn instructs us “you can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at tea,” for “the saints of God are just folk like me.” Most important, we singers resolve “I mean to be one too.” We would add, “like Ma.”

Thank you Wilma, for blessing our lives. Rest in peace in the arms of the Lord.

A funeral service will be held 10:00 AM Monday, March 28, 2016 at the Geo. J. Carroll & Son Funeral Home with the Rev. Hollis Parsons officiating. A family burial will take place at the Cogburn Cemetery at 1:00PM. The family will receive friends following the service at the funeral home.

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Memorial donations may be made to the Alzheimer’s Association, Greater Dallas Chapter, 4144 North Central Expressway, Suite 750, Dallas, TX, 75204-3208; Home Hospice of Cooke County, 316 S Chestnut St, Gainesville, TX 76240; or the Gainesville Independent School District Education Foundation, 800 South Morris Street, Gainesville, Texas 76240.