I know a woman with a heart of gold. Her laugh is contagious, her eyes twinkle with mischievous, however loving enthusiasm. She is so small, so frail. Her skin is as soft as satin bedsheets. She smells of vanilla.
I know a woman, who has experienced more in her ninety-four years than I would if I lived to be one hundred eleven. She's seen it all. She grew up in the twenties, survived the thirties, the forties. She danced through the fifties and the sixties. She loved through the seventies and the eighties. She laughed through the nineties. And now, she watches her children and her grandchildren and her great-grandchildren...grow up, survive, dance, love, laugh, through all of their troubles. And she is happy. Proud.
A friend once told me, "Death is the completion of life, not the end." And so we crowd together around her. We laugh, we cry, we hug, and we reminisce...and we smile.