A sweet, lovely, kind and gracious woman died this afternoon. I know she was surrounded by her family–her very large, loving, boisterous family who spent more than a week by her bedside–and died peacefully, and on her own terms.

One of her daughters, my good Montana buddy, visited us about 5 years ago back East. We took her and her mom to the beach.

We dined at an Italian cafe in Federal Hill.

And we (13 of us) had the wildest lobster party in history. Seriously. People still talk about it. We moved the furniture out of the living room, set up big tables, boiled dozens of lobsters, ate our weight in melted butter and drank lots and lots of wine. Then we went down to the basement and danced to a 1975 album of the best Idaho country-western music ever.

Two people fell into the laundry room, one of whom had just consumed 7 lobsters.
I do not exaggerate.

My good Montana buddy is very shy.  You hardly even know she’s in the room.

I’ve been searching through my computer files looking for pictures, but so many are at home, in yellowing plastic-coated albums.  But it’s still easy to remember the parties, Easters, summer game days, bridal spa afternoons and weddings.

“Mother of Nine”, we will miss you. Thank you for making us feel part of your family for the past 36 years. It was an honor.