When my husband’s uncle called to tell us his wife had passed away, I was sad. In only five days, we were to have left for Florida to visit with Bob and Mary. She was 75, too young to die.
     I’d met Mary only once; on our last trip to Florida 11 years ago. She and Bob were to attend a Minnesota Twins’ spring training game with us. The blustery March day had Mary begging off. She suggested "the girls" be dropped off at the local mall, where we could have coffee and chat. I had wanted to see the game, but could tell from our short time together at breakfast that Mary was someone to whom I should pay attention.
     You can learn a lot about a person from four hours at a food court. Mary and Bob had opened their home to my husband when he needed a place to live during his high school years. Mary apologized that day, saying she had been such a busy young mother, with children of her own, she hadn’t given my husband the attention he deserved. ("Johnny," she called him, affectionately.)
     That’s not the way he tells it, I assured her. He always spoke of her and Bob with gratitude and love, saying he learned a lot from them.
     When Uncle Bob called to tell us of Mary’s death, all this and more ran through my head. "She wasn’t afraid to die," Bob said. I knew that. Mary had the strong faith the nuns had talked about in grade school.
     Her funeral was lovely. One son and his family provided the music. The grandchildren, who loved their "Mimi," were involved. There were pictures galore in the back of the church. Those photos and his cousins (whom he hadn’t seen in 30 years) gave me a new sense of my John. He looks just like them: thick head of hair, even the shape of his head. They all called him "Johnny," just like Mary had.
     When one of the cousins, Bobby, stood at the altar to eulogize his mother, whom he called the greatest woman in history ("next to her namesake, Mary") he spoke of a dream he’d had after his mother passed. He looked heavenward and said, "Here we go, Mom," then told us of how she spoke to him as she probably had many times in his 45 years—repeating adages she wanted him to remember. To laugh often, love unconditionally, give more and expect less. To practice the Golden Rule, treating others as you would want them to treat you.
     Nothing Bobby hadn’t heard before, but lessons from a mother who wanted to give her son one last reminder, which he generously passed on to the mourners at the church.
     Bobby finished with the thought that the quality of his mother’s life provided her with a peaceful and happy leaving. As he spoke of his mother, it hit me that Mary hadn’t wanted to avoid the baseball game because of the foul weather. She wanted to spend time with me, to see if I was good enough for "Johnny," the boy she mothered during his high school years. The boy she taught the same lessons she passed on to her own children.
     And even though it is sad Mary is no longer with us, her "complete trust in the hereafter," as Bobby reminded us, gives us hope and solace. And her death reunited my husband with family, a reunion that could only have been orchestrated by Mary herself.