And...she’s gone.

Just about sunrise, on Independence Day, not a bad time to leave a broken body behind and step into eternity.

Beloved is handling this very well. He got some practice at letting-go, three years ago when his wife of 35 years graduated from earth life. It is harder for his siblings, none of whom are currently active in the church and thus are without that loving safety net which he and I share.

As it stands now, cremation in a few days, up in Wisconsin, and then a memorial service in her old ward in California in a few weeks. Possibly the rental of a huge van, large enough for eight adults and four children, and two twenty-hour drives with each of us taking a shift behind the wheel. We’ll figure it out. In the meantime, please keep this tribe in your prayers.

As Beloved says, she died with her boots on, doing what she wanted to do with people she loved. (And she didn’t have to go into assisted living, which was planned for October or thereabouts.) Three families are negotiating over who gets to keep her dog; I think the great-grands will win.

I wish I had had more time to get to know her better, but I am thankful for what time I’ve had. She was a remarkable woman: smart, funny, feisty, and kind. We will miss her.

We [yes, we] just picked 103 tomatoes (100 of them off of four plants); better than 450 Romas since we started picking, and some Early Girls for grilling. Two three-pound zucchini. Three dozen jalapenos, two dozen serranos, a couple dozen cayennes, five bell peppers. Sundry crookneck squash.

Looking into my crystal ball mixing bowl, I foresee zucchini bread in the very near future. Grilled tomatoes with our steaks later today. A batch of tomato sauce simmered up and bottled.

Our produce runneth over.