Remembering Betty

Linda and I went to our friend Betty’s funeral today, and it was a sad day for both of us. We all met at a creative writing class I taught almost twenty years ago, and it was the beginning of a wonderful friendship. Up until 2004, we got together almost weekly to write, talk about books and swap stories about our lives.
This morning I remembered something Betty once told me. As a child she had diphtheria and stopped breathing for several minutes. When this happened, she realized she was actually in heaven. Her grandmother—holding one of Betty’s cousins who had died as an infant—came walking towards her through a meadow filled with spring flowers. She told Betty that it wasn’t her time yet, and she had to go back. Betty said this experience removed any fear of death from her mind, and she was only five years old. So I’m thinking of her now writing poetry, tending to a garden and reading her beloved mysteries somewhere really, really special.