Kelly again...

I'll pick up where I left off in my last post...

After Kelly picked up the Kitchenaide, he went home and emailed me. It was an extraordinary message - letting me know that he had an inoperable cancer, that he was finding a new and deeper life in his death sentence...and ended with this:

Thank you for the Kitchenaid, the baking supplies and a moment to touch each other's souls.

I replied to Kelly, telling him about my sister's ovarian cancer...and thus began a 3 month email journey. Our emails were full, surprising jewels of human-ness.....He wrote to me of the awful abuse he'd suffered as a child in rural eastern Washington, growing up in a home without running water....but always with a spirit of victory rather than martyrdom. I told him of my recent heartbreak and my fears about my sister. He answered with heartbreak stories of his own....and kind words of support, encouragement and love. He promised to find resources to help my sister in Euguene...We discovered we both are fiends for Boggle and Scrabble, and that Thanksgiving is our favorite holiday.

When you meet a man who has a year or so to live, you would kinda expect that you'll be the "supporter", the "giver", the "nurturer", right?? What a surprise to find that Kelly's glowing, calm spirit has given more to me than I can imagine I have given to him.

After 3 months of email communication, I decided to help Kelly pass away the hours at a chemo treatment last week. Once again I received a surprise from Kelly! I walked into his tiny chemo cubicle to find a virtual Chemo Party going on! The room was full of friends...all of whom emanated the same shining goodness I've come to expect from my unlikely friend...

It was great fun. Conversation somersaulted from seat belt laws to politics to baking to music to movies...Afterwards, a few of us went to Starbucks for coffee and more talk and laughs, and by the time I left, I felt I had forever known Kelly. When I got up to go, he gave me a long, long bear hug and said "I just didn't expect to fall so completely in love with you!"

I got rid of a heavy duty mixer in August...and got a heavy duty friend from it by December.

Life is.....truly.....amazing........