During his five-year battle with colon cancer, Jim Abernathy of Roswell dedicated himself to keeping an online journal of his experiences to share with family and friends, making hundreds of entries up until five weeks before he died.
On Sept. 16, the day his doctor said there was nothing more that could be done for him, Mr. Abernathy wrote, "We all share a different view of hope, faith, and prayer. Miracles can occur. ... Let's look forward to working together and supporting each other as we move through the days ahead."
“Our big philosophy we always had as a family and that Dad really held on to the last few years, is cancer is not a solo sport," said Mr. Abernathy’s son, P.J. Anderson “Andy” Abernathy. "You really have to rely on friends and family around you to help you through it.”
That willingness to share a difficult period in his life through the Caringbridge.org cancer support website reflected Mr. Abernathy’s personality “as a man who cherished his family and friends and was incredibly giving and supportive of them,” his son said.
In another Caringbridge posting, Mr. Abernathy wrote, "We need to concentrate on all that will be good, and that we CAN DO, instead of that which we might not be able to do."
Paul James “Jim” Abernathy, 60, a sixth-generation descendant of the Abernathy family that settled on Abernathy Road in Sandy Springs, died Sunday at Hospice Atlanta. Visitation will be 6 to 8 p.m. Friday and 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday at Northside Chapel Funeral Directors, Roswell. Services will be 1 p.m. Saturday at Northside, which is handling funeral arrangements.
Mr. Abernathy was born in Atlanta, spent his childhood in Spring Springs and moved to the Crabapple area of Alpharetta at the beginning of his sophomore year at Milton High School.
After graduating from Georgia Tech, he worked as an investment banker for Ernst & Young. Besides Atlanta and Texas, the work took him to Saudi Arabia, England, Egypt and Bahrain. There, he joined Investcorp, an investment company based in Bahrain with offices in London and New York.
Mary Abernathy of Roswell, Mr. Abernathy’s sister, said her brother helped set up a program to teach high school students in Bahrain how to invest, and was instrumental in starting the Bahrain Institute of Banking and Finance, a financial services educational organization. After 11 years at Investcorp, he went to work for the institute in 2000.
For about the past eight years, Mr. Abernathy combined business with his passion for sailing: He became a shareholder of SailTime LLC, a fractional boat ownership concern based in Annapolis, Md., and held the SailTime Atlanta franchise at Lake Lanier.
He had married his high school sweetheart, Nancy Anderson Abernathy of Crabapple. They had two sons together. Nancy Abernathy died in 2001.
He and Hazar Al Shater, a Bahrain native and co-worker at Investcorp, were married in 2002. The couple have a 7-year-old son, Sami Jameson Al Shater Abernathy.
Mary Abernathy said her brother “had an impact on a lot of people’s lives he just never talked about.”
For example, she said, he mentored a student at Carver High School in Atlanta.
“Jim really helped give him guidance and direction after he graduated and kind of became a father figure to him,” she said. Now, that young man “is working for the city of Atlanta, helping his grandmother and pursuing his college education.”
Additional survivors include another son, Philip Jason Abernathy; sisters Paula A. Kirk and Amy A. Dobson; brother Lawrence Abernathy; mother Eugenia Brown Abernathy; and three grandchildren.
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