They were visiting with friends and family who all live in Michigan, while wintering in Florida. They had gotten together because their sister-in-law had come for a short visit — the first time of her being in the RV park where she and her husband had wintered together for many years.
The conversation got around to doing jigsaw puzzles. She said, “A friend sent a Monet double-sided puzzle to us.”
The puzzle had been sent as a gift following her husband’s heart surgery. The friend who sent it assumed he did puzzles with her because every puzzle was finished by him placing the last piece and posing for a photo.
When he asked to be reminded which of there friends had sent the puzzle, she replied, “Sue Spitler.”
“Sue Spitler?!?” their sister-in-law blurted out before continuing to share that Sue had made a donation to the church in memorial of her husband. Not recognizing the donor’s name, she had flagged the donation and when she came upon it again she had searched on line, found numbers for several people named “Sue Spitler” then called the one in Indiana, thinking perhaps it had been a customer of her husband. She felt such a strong desire to know from whom the gift had come.
Speaking to Sue Spitler, their sister-in-law had discovered Sue was not a customer, and had not known her late husband at all. The donation had been made because Sue wanted to honor the brother of her dear friend.
Interestingly, although that donation has been made 16 months earlier, their sister-in-law had come across the notation of the mystery donor and had done the internet search and made the call to identify “Sue Spitler” as the donor just three weeks ago …
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Death Is Nothing At All
by Henry Scott-Holland
Death is nothing at all.
It does not count.
I have only slipped away into the next room.
Nothing has happened.
Everything remains exactly as it was.
I am I, and you are you,
and the old life that we lived so fondly together is untouched, unchanged.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.
Call me by the old familiar name.
Speak of me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone.
Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow.
Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes that we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
Let it be spoken without an effort, without the ghost of a shadow upon it.
Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was.
There is absolute and unbroken continuity.
What is this death but a negligible accident?
Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight?
I am but waiting for you, for an interval,
somewhere very near,
just round the corner.
All is well.
Nothing is hurt; nothing is lost.
One brief moment and all will be as it was before.
How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!