Obituary

Wayne Heizer, of Leesburg, Florida was called home to the Lord on October 31, 2018.

Born and raised on a dairy farm in the Shenandoah Valley, Wayne spent the first third of his life working around cows and farm machinery. He was a member of FFA and 4H, showing dairy cattle and working farm related projects, including planting trees and even being a member of a group of young firefighters. He was educated after high school in Nashville, TN graduating from the prestigious Auto-Diesel College. He worked as a farm equipment mechanic for a local John Deere dealership, finding the opportunity, in 1977 to marry a gal from northern Virginia, that he met through a mutual friend at a square dance festival in Washington, DC. Along with his work; he loved to hunt, fish and just hang out in the local part of the National Forest, staying with wife and friends in a cabin with no electricity or running water. A bit of travel... camping trips, a week in Bermuda, and little weekends away from the farm kept him relaxed. His life journey then took him and his honey back to dairy farming and the birth of two children.

With the little girls in tow, life and work opportunities took the young family to Leesburg, Virginia, where he worked for UPS as a driver, and then a truck repair company as a mechanic, parts manager and full manager of a shop in Baltimore. The commute from Virginia led to a move to central Maryland in 1987. His work opportunities were varied during his 16 years there...more dairy farming, construction work, maintenance supervisor of a feed mill operation that he had actually helped to build, and then to inside work as a parts warehouse manager and shop steward with a NAPA dealership.

He became a member of the Knights of Columbus through his home parish of St. Timothy, organizing their blood drive program for 3 years. He also found a fantastic hobby - model rocketry. He joined High Flight Technology, a club in Frederick, Maryland and built rockets both from kits and "scratch", utilizing whatever building materials were at hand and flying them with large groups of rocketeers in multiple states on the east coast.

In 2003, with "little" girls having safely fledged from their home nest, he and his wife, Lynn, decided to strike out for a warmer climate to enjoy.

Moving to Florida, they settled in yet another Leesburg. Always the open-to-doing-anything guy, he worked for an irrigation supply company, a furniture store (as a repair technician), did general landscape work and all kinds of handyman and home renovation jobs in two local communities, drove the bulk delivery truck for the local newspaper and then getting his certification to operate as a backflow service and repair technician. This last job also enabled him to purchase and operate his own business, Ebb & Flows, that brought him the greatest amount of satisfaction and allowed him to really get to know his neighbors in the area.

His favorite methods of "time off" were to visit Playalinda Beach on the Canaveral National Seashore, take cruises with family and friends and to travel out of the country with Lynn to the land of his ancestors, Germany.

The plan was to retire in a couple of years, sell the home and business and purchase a bigger truck and a fifth wheel trailer and set off to see the rest of America and visit family and friends, and spend his later years on the road, just seeing what was beyond the next turn. But, the Lord had other plans.

Wayne was born in Staunton, Virginia, on December 2, 1953, the oldest of three children. He is survived by his wife, Linda (Lynn) Ruzicka Heizer, two daughters; Tina (Nicholas) Lemke and Stephanie (Greg) Cauley, his mother Betty Ann Miller, sister Wanda (Ralph) French, brother Jeff (Sara) Heizer, grandchildren; Kaitlyn, Christian, Evelyn, Gianna and Conner, nieces; Amanda (Nathan) Bitz and Suzanna (Mat) Henke, nephew Stuart Barton and three great-nephews; Ethan, Hunter and Ryker. He will also be remembered in a special way by his father-in-law, Joseph Ruzicka.