For Josepha
Sep. 5th, 2012 09:02 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lagilmanSince I couldn't be at Jo's memorial, being off to WorldCon by then, I asked a friend to read this for me.
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I've known Jo...more than half of my life. We met when I was a wee newbie editor, and she was, well, she was Josepha. Full of life, vitality, and chaos. Over the years, we became friends, co-workers, co-writers....
The last time I saw Jo, I was still living in New Haven, and she was in Milford. I'd picked her up at Ikea, and driven her and her packages home, as I made a habit of doing -- I had a car, and she didn't. We picked up food on the way home, and were settling into her then-new apartment to eat, and then put together the stuff she'd bought. I remember thinking that she, as usual, was trying to cram too much Stuff into the space, but Jo... you could tease her, but you couldn't change her.
I got sick midway through lunch, and had to go home. If I had known that was the last time we would be face to face, the last time we would meet...
But we're not given that kind of knowledge. Soon after that I moved back to NYC, sold my car, and our connection was limited to emails and the occasional phone call. And then came the slow deterioration of her condition, until those phone calls seemed to do her more harm than good.
And now she is gone.
Knowing that a death is coming, that it will not be averted, makes it no easier to bear, diminishes the bitter sorrow not a drop.
I miss her, my friend, my co-writer, my companion in mischief. I hope she knows, now, that she was never forgotten. That she will never be forgotten.
------------------------
I've known Jo...more than half of my life. We met when I was a wee newbie editor, and she was, well, she was Josepha. Full of life, vitality, and chaos. Over the years, we became friends, co-workers, co-writers....
The last time I saw Jo, I was still living in New Haven, and she was in Milford. I'd picked her up at Ikea, and driven her and her packages home, as I made a habit of doing -- I had a car, and she didn't. We picked up food on the way home, and were settling into her then-new apartment to eat, and then put together the stuff she'd bought. I remember thinking that she, as usual, was trying to cram too much Stuff into the space, but Jo... you could tease her, but you couldn't change her.
I got sick midway through lunch, and had to go home. If I had known that was the last time we would be face to face, the last time we would meet...
But we're not given that kind of knowledge. Soon after that I moved back to NYC, sold my car, and our connection was limited to emails and the occasional phone call. And then came the slow deterioration of her condition, until those phone calls seemed to do her more harm than good.
And now she is gone.
Knowing that a death is coming, that it will not be averted, makes it no easier to bear, diminishes the bitter sorrow not a drop.
I miss her, my friend, my co-writer, my companion in mischief. I hope she knows, now, that she was never forgotten. That she will never be forgotten.
