I have so many fond memories of her, even though we haven't known each other as long as I've known some people. I'd be sorely heartbroken and would cry and probably have to take a few days off to go up to her funeral, but in time I would come to accept the fact that she was gone. It's one thing to prepare yourself for the worst, but quite another to experience it.
I did experience it in 2005. I was hanging out with some friends of mine and we had just bought our burritos from Taco del Sol and were heading over to the theater to watch a movie. A friend of mine remembered that a lady on staff with Campus Crusade (a close personal friend, mentor, and my first confidante) who was overseas had fallen ill and had to be taken to the hospital. We decided to pray for her while we were driving (and no, we didn't have our heads down, eyes closed, or hands folded). Not two seconds after deciding this, my friend M gets a phone call. It's our campus director. Interestingly enough, I was impulsively thinking to myself, "If KW has passed away, I'll join staff." When M got off of the phone, she had an ominous look on her face and told us that we needed to head back to campus right then.
Halfway there on the way back she told us that our friend, KW, had passed away from acute lukemia. The rest of the way back was dead silent. We made it back to campus and just sat there for a while, burritos forgotten. We went into the dormitory and sat down in my friend A's room, which she had to herself so we didn't have to worry about other people coming in. After sitting there, we took it upon ourselves to tell the people who didn't know. Dozens of people were called and a lot of them came to the room. I personally went down to M and K's room and told them what had happened. They joined us upstairs in A's room for a while. C, who had just lost her best friend and soul-mate that summer to the same disease, took the news very hard, first exclaiming that it couldn't have happened. It was a long, long day.
Several days later we had a memorial service and the church was filled with loved-ones. So many people had so many nice things to say and I know just how special she was and how many people she impacted. Numberous people who had come to Campus Crusade said that the only thing they really remembered about their first time there was KW and how she had greeted them and made them feel so loved and welcome, myself included. I had a rough time, as this was the first person really close to me who I had lost. Even when my grandma passed away I didn't take it as hard, as I really wasn't very close to her.
Am I crying? Absolutely. She's the only person I've ever known who I trusted enough to tell anything. I've never been so open with another person, and even now I still have yet to find someone who means so much to me as she did (with the exception of my immediate family). I feel, however, that some day I will see her again, so I don't have to be sad. Heaven sounds just that much better, knowing that she's there.
Is that enough? If you'll excuse me, I'm going to wash my face now.
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