They're really saying I love you

Saturday Jim and I attended Linda Huppi's memorial service. We knew Linda from our church congregation. She was soft-spoken and unassuming, but a force to be reckoned with musically. For many years she accompanied musicians on the piano and the congregation on the organ, as well as serving in the church organizations for children, youth, and adults. Every year for thirty years she wrote and organized both a Christmas program and a Spring Sing concert. She even wrote her own memorial service, beginning with prelude music by Sounds of Grace Hospice Choir she belonged to, filled with musical offerings, and ending with a trombone solo, “What a Wonderful World”, which became a favorite of mine when we sang it for a Spring Sing several years ago:

I see friends shaking hands, saying how do you do,
They're really saying I love you.

Such a sweet thought. And just like Linda. All her quiet service was her way of saying to everyone she met, “I love you.”

Linda was just twelve years older than me. My walking buddy, Susanne, remarked this week, “Our children are going to weddings; we go to funerals.” Just two weeks ago, while I was in California, a friend of mine, just five years older than me, died of a sudden heart attack.

But life isn’t completely dreary. I was able to spend time in sunny California with my sister, her husband, and dear little Eliza while her parents took a vacation in London and Edinburgh. Although spring flowers and green leaves are still many weeks away, daylight savings time makes the days seem suddenly longer and full of light.

There's plenty of sadness, but it is a wonderful world.