three weeks later, and we find ourselves back in new hampshire … mourning the loss of the person who got us through the last funeral.

it’s poetic for my godmother gloria to move on less than a month after she lost her husband of 65 years — broken heart, of course — and i have to admit, i only thought that sort of thing only happened in the movies.

but that ignores all the plans that she had made for the coming months, and implies that she was the type to rollover — something we all know is simply not the case.

for every great thing i could say about paul, there is a parallel for gloria — the open doors, the family, stuffing us with food, always being there whether you asked or not.

this week, it was much the same story.

sparklet met a dozen of the most wonderful people that she may not have met otherwise … and was positively beaming the whole trip as she jumped from cousin to cousin to cousin.

and, i think the thing that mattered most to gloria was family, so it’s fitting that the very last thing she ever did was bring us all together.