Jane Lewis

What a strange and unsettling morning yesterday!  I awoke early and went outside onto our deck, and a south wind was blowing so hard that it was turning the leaves on the trees upside down.  The refracted sunrise, which we cannot directly see from Clear Creek Valley, was pink and turquoise, high clouds rushing past.  I thought about Jane Lewis while I was out there doing my Tai Chi, and when I drove up to Town for my long run of the week I thought and prayed about her, too.  We knew she was approaching the end, and we did not like thinking about the possibility of her making that final passage out at the Eckerd Center, as fine a place as it is, rather than surrounded by all of us.

It was overcast and misting rain in Town, and the wind was blowing hard, like one of those days at Atlantic Beach.  At 9:00 I realized there would not be any other runners, so I continued on by myself, completing seven solitary miles.  It had been a long week and a difficult one, and the final mile felt like the last mile of a marathon when there is no gas left in the tank. 

Everybody in Town except for the occasional runner passing me or the many dog-walkers out on the road was wearing a face mask, complying with the Governor's executive order that went into effect on Friday night.  On the way back home, I could see what looked like fog out in the valley below, but shimmering with a milky light.  I learned that this was the so-called Saharan Dust Storm, which had made a 5,000-mile journey across the Atlantic, the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico, and now was overtaking several of the southern states, blown on that strong south wind I had felt all morning.  My breathing felt tight, and Martha reported the same when she arrived home from her run; her asthma makes her more sensitive to pollen and ozone than I am.

We had just started to eat lunch at about noon when Martha's mobile rang; it was Kayla, one of Jane's caregivers (her favorite one, she said) reporting that she thought there had been a big change in her condition.  Martha called Angie, who lives closer to Town, and a Hospice nurse, and then left as quickly as she could.  I called in ten minutes and Martha said, "She's on her death bed."  So I left right away too, finding the two sisters and their brother Scott in Jane's room.  It was clear that she was failing rapidly.  She had already told her children that she loved them, and she smiled at me when I came into the room.  Bill, the other brother, had been called and was on his way, and so we pulled the curtains, prayed, and read scripture - Psalms 23 and 121.  Martha quietly played Jane's favorite hymn on her mobile phone.

Fairest Lord Jesus, ruler of all nature,
O thou of God and man the Son;
Thee will I cherish, Thee will I honor,
Thou, my soul's glory, joy, and crown.

Bill arrived then, and she looked at him and smiled.  It was as if she had been waiting for all of her children to arrive as she closed her eyes and smiled, and in a few minutes she was gone.  There could not have been a more peaceful passage from this world into the next than the passage this kind, gentle woman made.  As Angie's children began to arrive, we gathered downstairs and talked about how glad we were that she had died here in this way, in her own bedroom, rather than in a hospital, a nursing home, or the back of an ambulance.  What a blessing to leave this world surrounded by the things she loved and the people she loved.

It was a sad day, as losing a loved one always is.  But at the same time, as I reminded everyone in prayer, we found consolation and joy in knowing that she had gone to heaven peacefully, as she said she wanted to go. 

So Jane Lewis rests in peace this day.

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.

My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.

He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber.

Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is thy keeper: the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand.

The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.

The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul.

The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.