My friend, Claire, sent me an email to remind me that I hadn’t posted in a while and wanted to know if all was well.

No…

It isn’t…

While I want to say all is great, wonderful, and right with the world? I can’t.

I am blogging this with a ridiculously heavy heart and with tears in my eyes.

I had a friend who was funny, smart, caring, sweet, creative, artistic, nurturing, and just an all around loving, selfless human being.

She lost her fight with cancer yesterday morning.

My heart is broken.  A lot of hearts are broken.

She was my friend and I will miss the hell out of her.

She was a wife, a mother, a friend and a wonderful human being.

She made her corporate America husband morph into a teddy bear in less than two seconds.

She made us all laugh.

She was one of the ties that bound us together as family away from home.

She fought a good fight.

She made cancer her bitch for a long time.

Things went down hill about a week and a half ago.

She went to Chapel Hill a week ago tonight.

I spoke with her the final time last Friday to tell her I loved her and that I was thinking of her and that the girls and I were going to be ready to go to lunch whenever she was ready, even though we all knew better.  I went back to my office and cried.

She was able to be moved home on Mother’s Day.

She was surrounded by family.

I got the call yesterday morning that the battle was over.

I haven’t been able to keep mascara on.

We are heartbroken. We miss her. We loved her.

Our Relay for Life starts on Friday evening, several hours after her memorial service.  I will go and walk on her behalf and on the behalf of her family that was left behind.

Our team shirts say (with Bob the Builder as our mascot), “Can we beat it? Yes we can!”

Dammit…we couldn’t beat it soon enough…

Go in peace, sweet lady…you are loved and missed.