“Converting the sofa to a spare bed in the RPod 196!”

I am crushed. I found out yesterday one of my dearest friends in the world has passed away. Sparky was short but she loved big. She gave selflessly to the underprivileged and had a huge heart for animals. She told me she was one cat shy of being an official Cat Lady. She shot from the hip and didn’t pull punches. If you ticked her off, she’d tell you so to your face. We sent all those “not safe for work” memes that you can’t put on your Facebook page but that we thought were uproariously funny. She adored live music and went every chance she got. We chatted almost every day`and never went more than just a few days without checking in.

We graduated from high school together…Mr. Fixit and Sparky and me. Although we didn’t know each other until the Days of Facebook, we had become very close. She made me a better person…sometime kicking me in the butt to do it. She was at our wedding. She called from the car all the time. I’m not sure how to navigate again.

One of my favorite memories with Sparky was when I was pulling the Girl Camper Raffle Trailer around to the State Parks here in West Virginia. She was NOT a camper…not by any stretch of the imagination. So, when she texted me and said she had a surprise for me, I had no idea what to expect. Turns out, she wanted to go camping with me so I could write about it. You know, what it’s like to take a non-camper camping. We had a blast, but I have to say…she informed me she would NEVER be doing that again! You can read about it HERE.  

Sparky and I said I love you every once in a while when we hung up the phone. It was usually after we found out someone we knew had passed away. When I first came to West Virginia to live after Mr. Virgo died, one of our friends lost her son in a freak accident. Sparky and I went to the viewing together. It was the first time I’d set foot in a funeral home since Mr. Virgo was in one. I don’t know what she read on my face, but she waited an appropriate time then grabbed me by the arm and said, “Let’s get some air.” She always seemed to know what you needed and if she could give it to you, she knew where you could get it.

We cannot go through life without losing people we love. And we can’t live and love people without getting on each other’s nerves from time to time. But please…please…please, don’t ever miss the opportunity to let the people you love know that. Make it weird. Hug them. Give them goofy cards. Send them funny memes. Tell them they make a difference in your life. It gives me comfort that Sparky knew exactly how much I cared for her. 

Till we meet again, my friend.

❄️

“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.””

Revelation 21:4 ESV