My friend Nancy died in early February. A few weeks earlier we had gone for a ride in the car, and then stopped at my house for awhile. While we were talking, she said the following, which I wrote down verbatim as she talked and later read at her memorial service:
Notes from conversation with Nancy, around the New Year 08.
“I love the color and sounds of February. I love a February day when a storm is approaching, about 4 in the afternoon, before dark. If someone wanted to know me, my spirit is hiding behind each of those shades of gray-it’s not monochromatic- I’m not ambivalent- but open to the subtleties of those grays-
The wind, the solitude, the majesty of the ocean in an oncoming storm-
How the sea roils-
the crashing waves
the power of it
It opens the senses in a way the summertime with its crowds and glaring sun can’t do
There are beauties I admire in autumn with the changing of leaves but
The grays of February make us all one
I’m a little sucker for peace and harmony,
not good at confrontation.
I am a Libra of balanced temperament. If you want to find me you have to find a February day, and all those elements I’ve described. In Ken Burns’ Civil War book a soldier talks about how he will come back to be with his wife if he dies- I’ll come back to you in the sights and sounds of nature-
All this is a bit of vanity, as if my passing holds consequence."
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