Ruth and I are going to a funeral this morning. Not that is always a downer. Mary Evans was one of the first friends I made at the black Baptist Church when I first started going there 12 years ago. She was allready retired from teaching school. We struck up a conversation sitting at a table with a couple other people at coffee hour after church and immediately liked each other. I'd taught nature classed to kids for many years, and she'd grown up out in the country down South as I had in Wisconsin, so we had a lot of common experiences to talk about. What impressed me most about her was her humility. I'm a sucker for humility, it being so rare. She'd had a stroke a while back and when she came through it, she couldn't talk. She prayed to God to help her say the Lord's prayer, and that's how she slowly got her speach back. She said it took her several weeks, slowly struggling to mouth the prayer one word at a time. When she was telling me this, she was as fluid a speaker as she must have been all the years she taught. In the first few years I knew her, she was always frail, but she managed to make it to church most sundays. Then I'd see her less and less frequently, and she started slipping fast. The Deacons at the church are very good about going to pick up the sick and shut-in to bring them to church so I'd see her once in awhile. She always had a beautiful smile and would hold my hand in hers, beaming up at me. Ruth had known her casually too, many years before I joined the church.

Today is Mary's Home-going service and I'll sing with choir. She always loved to hear the Men's Chorus, and I know she'll have a good time. The most joyful thing about today is that I know Mary's forwarding address.

Jerry