Where MamaT learns a hard truth

.....that when things go bad, they go really bad. We've just found out that a dear, dear, dear friend has inoperable, untreatable cancer. Cancer that's going to kill her in 6-8 weeks. Cancer that probably just started a few months ago, and is so virulent that we got here before we realized that anything was happening.

This woman is my mom's age, and has been, for years, my image of faithful servanthood. You know how most people take on a volunteer job and give it up after a year or two? Telling you that they've "done their time" and now they can lay that aside? Not my sweet friend. She persevered in her volunteer work right up to the day of her diagnosis--when she was too exhausted to move out of her chair--and called me to apologize that she'd have to give up caring for the altar linens as she has done for years now. Oh, and I'd need to find someone to take her spot on Altar Guild. And she would miss it.

Oh, no, Miss Betty. It is I who will miss you. But I am grateful beyond belief to have spent these years as your friend.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us now, and in the hour of our death.