Friday, June 29, 2007

Sister for a Season

About a month ago I made my mom laugh. I told her that although my (older) brother is very very nice, what I really need at this point in my life is a sister. She found that humorous.

I think I told her that because I knew tonight was coming - the night before Maggie, my "sister" for the last 7 years, moves away. Pretty far away. Maggie and her husband are moving to Chicago.

I met Maggie right after my youngest was born and she became a part of our family in no time at all. She befriended my children, cared for them at times and brought strength and laughter into my home when I could feel or do neither.

She was our dinner guest on a Christmas Eve bringing
joy and excitement to our table that I so badly feared was missing. Afterwards, she stayed long enough to help me get my kids in bed so that Santa could, hopefully, get to work before holiday exhaustion took over.

She altered Halloween Costumes, hemmed Uniform Skorts and made monogrammed pillows. She gave the best hugs. She has the best laugh. We're pretty sure there's no one else like her...and that Chicago is really far from Florida.

But the Maggie Years have come to an end. Even though we'll go visit and she'll come back here, we have to move on and get used to life without her. And I have to try to show my kids that despite the sadness that naturally comes from losing the day to day closeness of our good friend, a part of her will always be with us. Because not only do we love her like crazy, she loved us well.

And she still does...just all the way from Chicago.

:-)

3 comments:

Sonflower :-) said...

Sometimes God gives us special people. Glad and Sad for you at the same time.

kddub said...

That is so hard. It is definitely bitter sweet. Lucky to have and have had maggie, yet sad to not have her in your life on a daily basis.

marianne said...

Yeah, tough saying goodbye. But...I've always wanted to go to Chicago!