The Gift Of One Year--One Year Later.

This post was originally published on November 14, 2011 to honor my cousin Linda upon her passing on 11/11/11 after a lengthy, difficult battle with a brain tumor. 

I'm reposting it today, again, to honor her.

My family received a gift that began last Thanksgiving and wrapped up this past Friday, November 11th. It was one more year with one of our most beloved family members, Linda.

Linda and Mama on the carousel at Rehoboth Beach, August 1987.

Linda was a special sort of person.  She was beautiful, fun and youthful.  She loved all animals and showed compassion to people, unless they were jerks.  If you were a jerk and you were around Linda, well, buddy, you'd be on your own.

Linda had many jobs during her short life.  She worked on an independent film, she coached gymnastics, she worked for the Philadelphia Eagles, waited tables and most recently, worked at the Delaware Nature Society.  I believe that this was her most treasured job out of all of them, and the one that suited her the best.  She loved the people she worked with.  Her biological family has certainly seen what a loving work family she had, and has, over the past year.  Beautiful people work at Delaware Nature Society, so it's no wonder Linda fit in so well there.

Because Linda had so many jobs, and subsequently lived in many different places, many hundreds of people had the pleasure of being touched by her grace and beauty.  Lots of people are hurting because of the loss of this gentle soul.

Last Thanksgiving night, Cecilia and Linda's sister, Chewa, discovered an ill Linda, after a day of un-responded-to text messages, calls and her not arriving to Thanksgiving dinner.  Over the past year, I have asked myself dozens of times "Why did they find her?  Why were they able, in essence, to save her?  Why didn't she just go that very night?"

I think I have my answer now.  Always enjoying playing hostess, Linda's last year afforded her family and friends memorable fellowship, renewed and new connections, and an extra year of beautiful memories of her.  Family members who we wouldn't have otherwise seen nearly as often, got to witness first-hand the amazing growth of my daughter.  We were able to have one more Christmas, one more Easter, one more summer.

True, Linda was not the same person she had been on and off through the past year, but that was only 1 of her 41 years.  Small potatoes in comparison to the whole batch of potato salad.  No onions, of course.

I will remember seeing Sting and the Lilith Fair with Linda.  I will remember trips to Hershey Park and many, many trips to the mall.  I will remember the ways she moved--working tirelessly in her flower beds, working the poles of our beach umbrellas down into the sand, spotting girls at the gym.  I will remember numerous trips to New York City, and having Linda show me how simple it was to drive to Trenton and take NJ Transit into the City.  I will remember Linda buying me my first drink in NYC when I was still in high school (sorry, Mom).  I will remember Linda reaming out the guy at Hershey Park Stadium when he told her she couldn't stand on her chair during a concert so she could see better.  I will remember moving Linda out, warming up a new house, wondering where a lost kitty had gotten to.  I will remember casts, crutches, and a scar incurred from standing on an aquarium.  I will  remember Linda's extreme command over a stick shift.  I will remember watching funny, funny movies with Linda and being able to make her laugh.  She was one of my favorite audiences.  I will remember trips to Ikea, drinking lingonberry juice and talking about it like it was some sort of magical potion.  I will remember once when Linda was babysitting me and I put one of those wrist bands-on-a-springy-cord kid holders around her wrist, and one around mine at bedtime, thinking it would keep her with me all night.  If only.

The beauty of Linda having passed is two-fold.  Her suffering is over and now she is with each of us, all the time.  Her loveliness surrounds us wherever, whenever, we call upon it--the last installment of Linda's gift to all of us.