Margaret Lavonne Loflin

BATON ROUGE — Margaret Lavonne Loflin, 75, died Saturday, Oct. 3, 2015, two weeks after celebrating her 75th birthday.

Lavonne was a 1958 graduate of Natchez High School and had a number of friends with whom she stayed in touch after she moved to Baton Rouge.

Lavonne married Colin Griffin, now deceased, and had two sons, Mark Evan Griffin and James Griffin, who still live in the Baton Rouge area. Mark has three daughters who were the joy of her life.

She married Keith Searing and is survived by her immediate family and by her brother Mack Elzy Loflin,  who lives in West Palm Beach, Fla.

In recent years, Lavonne’s health deteriorated from the aftermath of strokes, heart surgery and chronic back pain. She was unable to drive and lived a reclusive existence.

But she was almost always on the telephone reaching out to those who she felt she might help and share hope in some way. We spoke almost every day, but if one of her sons called, she would interrupt our conversation quickly to tell me that we would have to talk later. The boys were always her first priority. I can see her now, sitting in a rocking chair on her back patio watching the birds and squirrels in her back yard, spending hours on the phone.

Through frequent telephone calls to our aunt, Guynel Hall, who she loved dearly, she kept her in touch with the larger circle of friends and family.  She also talked with our cousin, Jean Easterling, who brought fun and laughter in her conversations. Both still live in Natchez. Just as with our mother, Yvonne Hall Loflin, and father, James Stanley Loflin, Lavonne always thought of Natchez as her forever home, too.

Lavonne Searing was buried very near our parents in the Greenlawn Memorial Park Cemetery on Morgantown Road in Natchez. As most of our family and many of her friends have gone before, she felt her world growing smaller.  She often told me that she didn’t want to be the last to go and made me promise that I would linger a bit longer. This poem captures my feelings as I grieve for the loss of my best friend and big sister.

We little knew that morning 

God was to call your name.

In life we loved you dearly, 

in death we do the same.

It broke our hearts to lose you,

You did not go alone.

For part of us went with you

The day God called you home.

You left us beautiful memories,

Your love is still our guide,

And though we cannot see you,

You are always at our side.

Our family chain is broken,

and nothing seems the same,

But as God calls us one by one,

The chain will link again.