Sad news about OFL

Today K-Bear picked me up in her mom vehicle.

"Has anyone ever told you that you clean up real well?"

Actually, they have. I launched into the story of Elly's wedding and how her brother Dr. Mike told me so, repeatedly. With my husband on one side of me and my six month old daughter on the other and my boobs leaking milk. "No, really. You look REALLY good." Um, thanks, Dr. Mike.

"We're doing pretty good, ignoring that big elephant in the room," K-Bear said.

Oh, yeah. THAT elephant.

We were going to the school to pick up our daughters, plus some extras, to do one of the saddest things I've had to do so far in my middle-aged life.

This sounds like fiction, but we were taking the Brownie troop to to funeral of their troop leader.

Our Fearless Leader died late Tuesday of a very rare, aggressive cancer. She was diagnosed two years ago.

That picture up there? Our Fearless Leader is the one in the middle--the one without hair. Mergs, in black on the far right, is making her laugh. It's just as well OFL's eyes are shut; she had a horrible eye infection at the time. Left to right, the lovely ladies are Former Cookie Mom, K-Bear, OFL, New Cookie Mom, and Mergs. Missing from the picture are me and KM who was in the rest room. I don't remember where the rest were, but suffice to say they were nearby.

These women kick ass. All the Brownie moms do, of course (particularly 'Licia). These women--um, let's put it this way: I can pray with them, and I don't feel that way about many people.

So there we were at the church--the Brownie contingent. Strangely enough, most of us were dressed in brown. The girls had their uniform vests on, which was sweet because we told them it was entirely up to them. All of those that remembered to bring them, wore them.

In the next section over were the red-shirt contingent. Our Fearless Leader worked at the Red Dot Retailer, so her peeps from the several stores where she worked all sat together. Then there were the Suits from the Potato and Corn Chip Company; OFL's husband worked there for years (until he was laid off last week) and so the guys were there for him.

I'm not going to talk about the funeral itself.

As it ended, one of the girls in the troop said, "I'm going to go see Izzy," and the rest agreed; they hustled to the front of the church.

Izzy is OFL's daughter, who of course is also in the troop. Who has just lost her mom.

You know the Girl Scout motto?

"Make new friends,
but keep the old.
One is silver,
the other is gold."

Our Fearless Leader taught 'em good.