Tish and Livia: Our Angels

The Dewar Properties Christmas party was tonight: fun and festive, and the crowd of seventy-five or eighty seemed to really enjoy it. Many of the employees have worked there for a long time, and the atmosphere is more like that of a family than a business. Smart and capable, they appear to genuinely care about each other and their work, which probably explains why they function so successfully as a team.

Tish Johnson is Jimmy's longtime business partner, and CEO of Dewar Properties; she is also one of his best friends in the world and his surrogate sister. She is a remarkable person, a real-life Wonder Woman; the longer you know her, the more you begin to appreciate all that she is: brilliant businesswoman, devoted wife, loving and involved mother and grandmother, loyal and caring friend. All of this, and she looks like the perfect Southern belle.


Livia Tatum is Jimmy's personal assistant, and has worked for him and kept his life running smoothly for twenty-plus years. She is an indispensable source of knowledge and a miraculous solver of problems. Everyone in the office has long been accustomed to Jimmy's frequent bellowing, "LIVIA!!"

We are almost nine months now into this medical ordeal, and we owe a lot to a great many people. But I truly don't know what we would have done - either of us - without Tish and Livia.