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Suzanne Shelton Razook died on March 31, 2017. Sue was a spouse, mother, sittee (grandmother), professional, and friend to many. We will miss her brilliance, humor, beauty and warmth.
Sue was born on March 29, 1949, and grew up in Duncan, Oklahoma. She was the third child – the baby – of John and Loretta Shelton. Her parents and older sister and brother knew from the start that Sue was warm, clever and strong-willed. She excelled in school and made many friends. She graduated from Duncan High School in 1967, married her high school sweetheart Robert Bosley, and attended the University of Arkansas. Although they separated, they remained friends until he died. She then enrolled at the University of Oklahoma where she met and married Robert Caywood. She followed Robert to California where he served in the Navy. In 1972, Sue had her first child, April, in California, and then in 1974 her second, Joshua, back in Norman, Oklahoma, where she lived as a single mom and finished her BBA in Finance at OU. It was at OU where Sue met Nim Razook, whom she married in 1979. Thus began over thirty-seven years of marriage, love and friendship. In 1984, Sue and Nim had their third child, Alexander.
Sue was emotionally connected to others. She adored children and was a “mom” to her children’s friends and her friends’ children. Those who knew her loved her warmth and the fact that she made them feel like they were special. Nim insisted that Sue’s best friend was the person with whom she was talking.
Sue was smart, if unwilling ever to flaunt her talents. She was very good at Finance and applied her OU degree in jobs at Dunn and Bradstreet and then Liberty Bank in Oklahoma City. She was also wonderfully literate and interesting. At her peak, Sue read two to three books a week. Her favorite authors were Ann Tyler, Jane Smiley, Alice Munro, Philip Roth, William Styron, and John Updike. Jane Smiley’s comment that “many people … feel better at the mere sight of a book,” was true for Sue. Her enthusiasm for words and ideas guided most everything she did. As her illness progressed, it robbed her of her ability to read, understand and learn. This was not only difficult for her but for those who knew and loved her. One of the last books that truly engaged her mind and emotions was Isabel Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Suns. Nim remembers Sue lying in bed and crying over this wonderful account of the African-American migration from the South to the North during Jim Crow days.
Sue loved her family. She loved being a sister, wife, mother and grandmother. She adored her brother Dale (Buz), an independent thinker and doer who was always there when Sue needed him most, and her sister, Julia, with whom Sue remained close to the end. Sue was very proud of her three children, April, Josh and Alex, who all found their ways and became loving and genuinely decent adults. She was “Sittee” to her four grandchildren, Alyssa, Jake, Alexis, and Katherine, and relished the time she spent with them even after she became ill. When in Hospice, she routinely asked Nim to show her the picture of all four of her grandchildren and to talk about each one.
Sue’s friends were like brothers and sisters to her. Her two life-long friends, Melissa Hearn and Georgia Berry, were not only constants in her life, but were there every day to see to her needs when she was ill. Betty and John Lancaster were also friends to the end and provided support and care to Sue and Nim.
Sue’s mother and Father, Loretta and John Shelton, predeceased her. So did her brother Buz. She is survived by her sister, Julia Kardel, in Houston, Texas, her husband, Nim Razook, at home, her daughter, April Caywood, in Austin, Texas, with David Houston and two children Jacob Caywood and Katherine Houston, her son Joshua Caywood, in Edmond, with his wife Rachel Caywood and their children Alyssa Caywood and Alexis Caywood, and her son Alexander Razook in Norman.
Sue and her family would like to thank the kind nurses and aids from Alpha Hospice, with special thanks to Melissa Hyde, Karlie Zahradka, and Rolanda Canada. Melissa and Karlie were more than nurses. They comforted Sue and Nim through these tough times with both love and professionalism. Rolanda tended to Sue’s hygiene with such love and tenderness. For Sue it was like having a spa at home.
A memorial service celebrating Sue’s life will be April 22, 2017, at 1:30 p.m. at the Havenbrook Funeral Home, Norman, Oklahoma. Sue’s family would ask that any memorial contribution in Sue’s name be directed to Transition House in Norman, Oklahoma. thouse.org
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