JEANNE

"A friend is someone who knows all about you, and still loves you..." - Elbert Hubbard ( 1856-1915)

Friendship is when you go out for a walk and accidently knock the other person into shrubs at the side of the road.  Jeanne just laughed and laughed. This has become one of my favourite pics . Jeanne flailing out of the bushes, laughing to beat the band. It was a hot July day and we spent it together down at the beach, after I pulled her 4 foot frame out of the dirt.

We met  at least 45 years ago. She was an adult student at the music school. One of  few adults brave enough to come back to school with a bunch of "kids". She carried her violin case, looking for a place to sit. She  returned to school to learn to become a music therapist. But it was daunting......

She became my orchestra partner, my lunch buddy, kind of a mother figure, more of a friend than anything else. And she DID become a music therapist a few years later. Mostly we liked to be silly together. 

Jeanne was the sweetest, kindest person I knew. She sat with my mother before she died, and played at my wedding a few months later.She was there. Was always there.

Jeanne sent me this pic long ago......Only one I have with her violin.

Her feet never quite touched the floor in orchestra. Most chairs did not work for her. Often I would see her swinging her feet.

          She loved orchestra. More than I did. She practised. I did not. 

She stayed with my family and I, often , in later years.  I would ply her with coffee and pastries in the morning so she would be well fortified  to do some duets. We'd laugh and she'd sit on the chair and swing her feet. " I auditioned for the Wizard of Oz , you know," she would joke.

Jeanne had children, grandchildren, GREAT grandchildren. And those of us who were her friends. And there are oodles of us.

"Good friends help you to find important things when you have lost them.....your smile, your hope and your courage.." -Zoe Zantamata

Jeanne drove all the way down to California to visit me, many moons ago.  I wanted to stuff myself into her bag and make her take me back with her. She sat on one of my chairs, swinging her feet. It was like old times.

In the later years, I couldn't always visit Jeanne, so I decided I would phone her. Every day.

I was faithful with the phone calls. Jeanne laughed when I asked her if she had found a chair the right height for her. I sent her new violin strings for her violin, as a birthday present. Flowers every other year.

They were glorious years. Even across the miles. She played at my wedding. She wore red. "So people can see me and not trample me in the crowd!" she joked.

And when we did meet up, she was full of bubbles, charm and wit. And she would laugh. Then we would all laugh with her. Didn't matter about what. We'd be silly together, like always.

Before she died, in the last conversation we had a few days before, she said:  "a person knows when it's time to go....a person knows. You gets everything in order then it's time. that's what I believe." She must have told me that over and over that day. And then she was spirited away.  To the place she longed to be.

But I will always see her sitting on a chair too high for her, holding her violin, and swinging her feet. And hear her laugh, and hear her  tell me that it's all right........she's where she ought to be.

"Never forget the days I spent with you. Continue to be my friend,  as you will always find me yours.." -Beethoven

Photographs 2021