the inevitable

My partner and myself in crime on this end of life care thing have been sort of stunned at the death of our old church friend. Way back when, we dressed up on Easter and went to vacation bible school and learned to be good little southern Methodist girls, in the Wesleyan way of course. It was at that church that I became one of those girls who COULD have been. The leadership never fully embraced the vision of women as people of Big Ernie except for teaching SS and singing in the choir. Oh...and frying chicken for the picnic and keeping the nursery. Sally's mother Miss Betty was the nursery keeper for an entire generation of kids in this town. All three sisters are redheads and love animals thanks to their mama'n'them. When I went to visit PL during girl scout cookie season one year, there were a whole bunch of dogs and cats up in there. That's the way they roll. Mr.PH let us use his warehouse down on Cedar to store all those cases of cookies. Being the county chairman is NOT something I would ever do again. Reverse bucket list, if you will.

Sally is the middle of the three girls. I haven't seen much of her lately what with work and all the drama that is my family. I did see her on Christmas eve eve when she was spending time at the sawmill. HIPPA be damned, I found her and snuck in to give her one last hug because I just knew that chances like that aren't to be wasted. She told me she loved me...but then she loved everybody. Like a child, Sally spent most of her life looking for special moments and living them with every ounce of the magic that she believed in with all her precious little heart. "Precious" seemed to be one of her favorite words.

I think I learned to really love animals through this family. They showed me that pets are family members and need to be protected just like the kids and such. When you're all sprawled out on the couch with a pile of puppies and people that you love, everything seems like it's all good. This doesn't apply to hawks owls, as I found out yesterday. Those talons are sharp when a bird gets the energy up to use 'em! My friend Claude works for this place where people bring all sorts of critters in. She knows the law and the proper way to rehab an animal. Thank goodness she was there yesterday when the owl was sitting on the dryer in a box waiting for his chance at freedom. Didn't even have him long enough to give him a name. Damn...it might have been a girl!

We're keepin' the faith around here. Believing that you are doing the same ^j^