Goodbye Judy

She was one of the kindest people I've ever known. She had a laugh that really filled up a room. She smiled with her eyes as well as with her mouth. Talented seamstress, and dedicated teacher. When I approached her hospital bed I was so glad that I had come because I knew just from my intuition that it was going to be a goodbye. As she lay there, her own body betraying her more and more each day, she had the grace to declare that I "looked healthy as a horse". She was funny right up until the end, and though her body was failing her, her spirit never did. She was herself. That is what is so hard-reconciling the loss of someone who was always so full of life. Judy said farewell to the three of us, and she cried, and the three of us cried because we all knew the score. I watched her girls hold onto one another in their grief and in their sadness, and I cried all the more because I realized they were losing their mom. She was too young to go; she lost her battle to that hideous disease for which a cure still eludes us. I am saving those pink yogurt lids now, and I will send them in to try to make some kind of difference in the battle on cancer. Wife, mother, grandmother, friend, teacher. She said she wasn't able to draw enough breath or push it out with enough force to do something she loved so much-sing. She is singing now for sure. Judy, you will be missed by so many.