They Began Building Their Wyoming Dream House Together; Then, He Died

He was by no means the plan. And he or she knew he’d be hassle from the minute she noticed him.

Lynn Hanzlik met her husband, Curt, whereas she was in nursing college. He was the brother-in-law of her greatest buddy and it could not have been love at first sight for her, but it surely definitely was for him.

Hanzlik was a single mother, placing herself by means of college. She had her son, and her lessons, and her work and the very last thing she wanted was a whirlwind romance.

“I keep in mind leaving class,” Hanzlik advised K2 Radio Information. “And [my friend’s] husband pulled up on this little white Ford Ranger and sitting within the passenger seat was this different burly, furry man. And I checked out my buddy and I mentioned ‘Oh, no. That is one’s hassle. No. Not even. No.’”

Hanzlik mentioned her buddy launched the 2 of them and he or she stored operating from the potential romance. She’d been damage earlier than and, because the saying goes, she was a powerful, impartial girl. She actually did not want a person. However it was by no means about want. It was about need.

Hanzlik mentioned that her plan was to complete college and maintain her son, Nicholas. That was the objective. That was the plan.

However plans change.

Curt by no means gave up his pursuit. For 3 years, all three years of Hanzlik’s education, he pursued her. He would present up at one of the best buddy’s home just because he knew Hanzlik can be there.

Finally, Hanzlik mentioned, she gave in. As soon as she graduated from the College of South Dakota, she lastly mentioned she’d go on one date with Curt. She’d give him one likelihood.

It was all he wanted.

“That is all it took,” she laughed. “We dated for fairly a brief time frame, after which we had been engaged for about three months and I mentioned ‘Yep, that is it. That is the one.’ So we had been married on September 25, 2004 after which we had our honeymoon child, Chloe, 9 months later.”

Going from a ‘No’ to a ‘Let’s get married’ is kind of the dramatic swap however, Hanzlik mentioned, he did not give her a alternative.

“I feel it was his pursuit,” she mentioned. “He had not given up. There was no stop in him. He was similar to, ‘You’re my every little thing.’ He at all times referred to as me his queen, and he handled me like a queen.”

It is a kind of tales that seems like a fairy story. It was a narrative of boy meets woman and it ought to have ended with happily-ever-after. However, life is not any fairy story and typically the ending we take into account isn’t the one which we truly get.

For 17 years, Lynn and Curt bought to reside their fairy story, although. They bought to go on dates, and lift a household, and dance within the kitchen. They bought to play sensible jokes on one another and so they bought keep up till the early morning hours, speaking and laughing and falling deeper and deeper in love.

For 17 years, they lived in South Dakota. She was a nurse. He was a handyman. That they had another little one collectively, Curt Jr., after which they determined they wished a brand new journey.

Hanzlik had grown up on a ranch in Sundance, Wyoming. And collectively, the 2 determined that they wished to maneuver again to Sundance and construct a home on her household’s ranch.

Hanzlik discovered a nursing place open on the Criminal County Medical Companies District, in Sundance, Wyoming. She spoke with the CEO there and it felt like an ideal match. She simply needed to inform her husband.

“I got here house from work and I sat down and Curt checked out me and mentioned, ‘I’ve bought some information,’” Hanzlik remembered. “And I mentioned, ‘I’ve bought some information too. I am going first.’ And I mentioned ‘I just about have a job in Sundance. What do you concentrate on shifting?’ And he mentioned, ‘I had a money supply on the home. What do you concentrate on shifting?’”

And so, on April 1, 2021, the 2 determined that they had been going to maneuver to Sundance, they had been going to reside in RVs, and so they had been going to construct their dream home. Most significantly, they had been going to do it collectively.

However plans change.

The 2 spoke with Hanzlik’s dad and mom and so they mentioned it was okay to construct the home on their land. They outlined the plans on graph paper, and so they started working.

“He knew constructing,” Hanzlik mentioned of her husband. “I imply, it was his life. So he mentioned, ‘Okay, we’re gonna go to Menards and we’re gonna get a pole barn equipment.’ He enlisted the assistance of our native Amish to assist him set poles and get the beginning of it going. And he just about constructed the entire construction.”

Hanzlik mentioned they tinned the home, enclosed it, put up all of the home windows and doorways, spray foamed it, and extra. Curt framed nearly your entire home and Hanzlik and their kiddos helped after they might; after work and faculty, or on the weekends. It was one thing to do as a household.

That was through the spring and summer season of 2021 – it was the proper time to be exterior, to be beneath the solar, to be constructing one thing.  However after a couple of months, the solar began setting earlier and the night time began coming quicker. It bought chilly.

Winter was coming and there was nothing they might do about it.

“There is a weekend that I keep in mind after we had been placing up partitions, and he goes, ‘I am simply actually drained. I am tremendous drained,’” Hanzlik remembered. “He was a smoker and wasn’t tremendous wholesome together with his ldl cholesterol. Us nurses, we like to make things better. So I consistently barked on him about his consuming habits, however guys are guys…”

They rested by means of November, understanding that their home would nonetheless be standing come spring.

However then, on the morning of December 5, every little thing modified.

“He awakened that morning and mentioned he did not really feel good,” Hanzlik mentioned. “He vomited. And inside quarter-hour, he was face down on my camper ground. He handed away in entrance of me. And he was like, 250 kilos. He was an enormous man, and I am not that huge. So I could not roll him over. As a nurse, you suppose ‘I am gonna repair it. I am gonna cease it. I can do one thing.’

“And typically you simply cant. You possibly can’t repair every little thing.”

Hanzlik instantly referred to as 9-1-1 however there was nothing they might do.

“There was no post-mortem, however we’re fairly certain it was an enormous coronary heart assault or what we name an stomach aortic aneurysm, as a result of he went so quick,” she mentioned. “The ambulance had gotten there and so they had turned him over and began CPR, however there was nothing.”

Fortunately, Hanzlik mentioned, their two youthful kids weren’t at house. However Hanzlik referred to as her oldest son, Nic, and he got here proper over.

“You are in shock,” she mentioned. “In your thoughts, you go, ‘He is gone and he is not coming again.’ And you then begin serious about, ‘What am I going to do? I am not ready for this. This was not purported to occur to me.’ Your life accomplice leaves you and you’ve got all these hopes and desires and it is actually onerous.”

Hanzlik mentioned that Nic was her rock throughout that interval. Finally, they referred to as the youthful two children and defined what had occurred. In addition they referred to as Curt’s different daughters from a earlier marriage.

“It is such a stunning expertise,” she shared. “You simply do not imagine it. And regardless that it occurred proper in entrance of me, I nonetheless do not imagine it. You suppose they’re gonna stroll into that door and provide you with a hug and a kiss and say ‘How was your day?’”

When any person you’re keen on dies, the world stops. For a very long time, nothing else issues – not work, not friendships, not something. Some folks fall into their grief, wrapping themselves in it like a blanket. Others attempt to be productive; they deal with the duties at hand to maintain themselves shifting. Lynn Hanzlik fell someplace within the center. She knew she needed to end the home. It was their dream venture, their largest objective. And regardless that he was gone, she knew that she needed to end the home. So, the plan was to wipe her tears, take a deep breath, and end it herself.

However plans change.

Sundance is a small city. It is picturesque, in plenty of methods. Like within the films, all people is aware of one another, all people cares about one another and, when tragedy strikes, all people helps one another.

Hanzlik works for Criminal County Medical Companies District and, very similar to the city itself, CCMSD is one thing of a household. So when Dr. Waddell, a doctor with the clinic, heard about what occurred, he started working.

“I despatched Dr. Waddell’s spouse a video of what we had achieved to this point, which was not so much,” Hanzlik mentioned. “I had no plumbing. However I had partitions And so Dr. Waddell got here out and mentioned, ‘I understand how to do plumbing stuff. I will assist train you stuff, too.”

Hanzlik mentioned that her husband had already laid the groundwork; he’d purchased the entire provides. It was all able to be put collectively, even all the way down to the sheet rock ready to go up on the partitions.

“So Dr. Waddell got here out, he climbed into my rafters, and he began placing pecks collectively and educating us put pecks collectively,” she mentioned. “We had the plans laid out about precisely how every little thing was purported to go. And he helped so much. We bought plumbing put in and we began placing up sheet rock at night time and screwing it in, after which simply began mudding and taping.”

Dr. Waddell was not the one individual to supply his help to the Hanzlik household.

“We had another associates that will come out and assist us, too,” Hanzlik mentioned. “A tremendous girl named Pam Jensen helped me out a lot. She was retired, and he or she would present up at my home and dust and tape whereas I used to be at work. I might come house at night time and he or she would have the partitions stuffed in, and he or she’d simply encourage me.”

It is onerous when any person dies; no one actually is aware of what to say. Properly-wishers need to say they’re sorry for the loss, however nothing ever truly feels comforting. Jensen knew that, so she did not speak a lot.

“She was simply calm and useful,” Hanzlik mentioned. “She would not inform me what wanted to be achieved, she would simply ask ‘Is it okay if I do that?’ Or ‘Can I simply present up and do issues?’ And over even only a few weeks of working collectively, it has been a beautiful friendship that we have made.”

Coworkers and neighbors helped as a lot as they might to get the home achieved. However Lynn’s largest helpers had been, unsurprisingly, her kids.

“It was an excellent distraction and one thing that we knew we wanted to do,” Hanzlik mentioned. “My son CJ mentioned ‘Mother, dad confirmed me do all these things. I understand how to do that.’ And I am like, ‘Properly, he confirmed me do stuff too!’ You would not count on a nurse and a few youngsters to know put up sheetrock or to have the tools. However I do.”

She continued, stating that “It was an excellent bonding expertise with me and the youngsters. A bit of butting of heads at occasions as a result of all of us get cranky and drained. However we had been at all times collectively in the home, engaged on one thing.”

They labored by means of the winter, the spring, one other summer season, and extra. The home is not fairly completed but, but it surely’s shut. It even withstood what might have been one other tragedy.

On July 31, 2022, the Nationwide Wildlife Coordinating Group reported {that a} wildfire had began close to Sundance and it prompted evacuations.

“The Fish Fireplace was reported on Sunday, July 31 at 11:30 a.m,” the NWCG wrote. “The hearth is positioned 7 miles south of Sundance, Wyoming and east of Wyoming Freeway 585. It’s on the Bearlodge Ranger District, Black Hills Nationwide Forest in steep, rugged terrain on Iron Mountain. The hearth began on non-public land and was human precipitated.”

Hanzlik mentioned that she and her children needed to evacuate the world.

“We ended up placing every little thing we owned in our campers to tug away, and we needed to go away this home behind that we had labored so onerous on,” Hanzlik mirrored. “And the very last thing I mentioned to the Forest Service man was ‘Please, out of something, simply save the constructing. Save the home.’”

Fortunately, they did not have to. The hearth did unfold, but it surely did not attain their home. It was finally put out by firefighters and tragedy was averted.

“We had no thought, from the time we left till two days later after we truly bought again to the property, if we even had our home left,” she shared. “So I bawled my eyes out once I noticed it. As soon as we lastly bought again and began shifting beds in I mentioned, ‘We’re achieved. I do not care. We’re by no means leaving this place once more.’ And the youngsters agreed.”

So, they have not. They’re placing the ending touches on the home now; these little issues that flip a home into a house. This was a dream venture for Lynn and Curt, and it became a dream venture for Lynn, her kids, her coworkers, her neighbors and, actually, your entire neighborhood.

“I could not have achieved something with none of them,” Hanzlik mentioned. “I like all of them dearly, and I simply can’t thank them sufficient. If you undergo a tragedy, until another person has been by means of one thing like that, it is onerous to supply consolation. However there aren’t any phrases that may actually say how a lot appreciation I’ve for a way a lot assist everybody has given.”

Possibly Lynn Hanzlik did not get the precise ending to her happily-ever-after that she wished. She misses Curt, each single day. However she nonetheless sees him – in CJ’s eyes or in Chloe’s smile or in Nic’s humorousness.

She nonetheless sees him. She nonetheless hears him. And, in these early night hours when the solar is setting simply previous the horizon and he or she steps out of her entrance door to take the entire scene in – the home, and her kids within it – typically she will even really feel him, as if he had been standing proper subsequent to her.

She permits herself to really feel that, to really feel him, as he places his arm round her shoulder, pulls her in shut and says ‘Boy, is not it purdy out right here?’

To listen to K2 Radio Information’ with Lynn Hanzlik for Report back to Wyoming, go to our On Demand hyperlink right here.

Images of the household, and their home, may be seen under: