My Aunt F passed away last night. This comes as no surprise to me or anyone else in the family. She has been terribly sick for a number of years and incredibly frail for about the last year or two. We all knew it was coming soon. I will miss her and I am sad at her passing, though relieved that she is no longer in so much pain. My main concern now is for the living: my uncle, my nieces, nephews, and her grandchildren.

I will remember her as a kind and mild woman who had a great passion for her family, who raised and presided over a large brood of children and grandchildren, who hung on to life tooth-and-nail to see her grandchildren born and growing up.

By all the measures of life that were important to her—-husband, children, siblings, extended family, church family, and kindness toward others-—her life was full and rich: a thing to be celebrated.