‎"There's a rainbow of babies/Draped over the graveyard"

(John Prine reference)

My dear friend Glenna: You would be pleased to know that I spent the weekend involved with the grandboys, their parents, and their friends in a birthday party. It was a car racing theme, per the young man turning four, and there was lots of water play involved, as you might imagine, along with all of the racecar theme stuff. You would have loved it. I know that about you.

I did not know that you had passed away because I was busy with all of this celebration of young life (even if that counts not being part of it in the early stages, at least not much, for whatever reason). I think you would have accepted that as a valid excuse to miss your passing.

How you and I became such devoted online friends, here and elsewhere, is not so hard to imagine. Yes, you were a devout Christian and I am this Agnostic heathen. Otherwise, we seemed to have much in common, beginning with the fact we shared two cancer diseases, head/neck cancer and lung cancer. More important, we love our kids, we love our grandkids, and you, oddly, share at least a large part of my sense of humor (and then there is the matter of the Patriots ).

There are few that have been more encouraging about my wiriting than you, few that have indicated more ardently that you found something to smile about in my writing and looked forward to reading more of it.

And there were few that seem more adamant in the notion that hope and humor can carry us far, carry us well, for as long as we survive.

You are, you were, a strong reminder that persistence, and Hope, and Humor, make for better days and longer lives, along with, I'm pretty sure, your faith and the support of your family.

You will be missed by a legion of folks who relied on you for support in so many ways.

As you know, I will miss you too, sweetness. I will miss you more than you can imagine.

Take care, Glenna,

Joe