Remembering Margie

The day after Thanksgiving, I found out that my childhood friend died. We'd just spoken a few days before so the news was quite a shock. After years of what can only be described as extremely sporadic communication, two years ago Margie and I reconnected. The circumstances that brought us together were unfortunate. Margie had flown from Australia, where she was working as a child psychiatrist, to attend a reunion at Stanford University. A day into the festivities, Margie tripped on a curb and fell, breaking her hip and fracturing her shoulder. Because she had only recently recovered from a spinal fusion, these additional injuries rendered her helpless and she ended up staying at the home of her good friends Carol and Mark, who lived about an hour from me. Several weeks later it was clear that Margie wouldn't be able to return to Australia until her hip and shoulder healed, something that could take months. It was then that I volunteered to drive her to her parent's home in Arizona where she could convalesce and begin physical therapy. There is no better way to reconnect with someone than to spend hours in the car with them.

By the time we arrived in Arizona, Margie and I had talked about everything from the ballet lessons we took when we were three and four to her fears about never being able to return to work. Upon hearing the news about Margie's death, I was overwhelmed with sadness, but Carol's suggestion that we "remember the good times," has helped me pull through. There are others who will speak to Margie's professional accomplishments, her brilliant mind that never forgot a fact, her ground breaking work in hormone therapy, and her work with in treating veterans and children. My memories are from a different time and place, when life was simple and our problems few. When our summers consisted of playing jacks, swimming, and stealing sugar packets out of the snack shack, and having a huge crush on the lifeguard and fantasies about kissing him as soon as we turned thirteen. Back then, our biggest concern was learning how to use tampons so we could swim in the next meet. Our biggest problem was avoiding taunts from the swim club bully, a short chubby kid whose only weapon was his sharp tongue. We lived for ice cream sandwiches, five more minutes in the pool, and Fourth of July fireworks. We pricked our fingers with safety pins and became blood sisters. In a high school social club, Margie was my "little sister." And most recently, as adults, Margie was my confidant, advisor, and dear, dear friend who wouldn't want me to be sad about her passing, who would expect me to remember the good times as Carol suggested.

I don't know if or when there will be a memorial service for Margie, but because those of us who were touched by her life, live in so many different places, I would like to suggest that this post be used to launch a virtual memorial service where her friends and colleagues far and wide can share their memories, their good times.

P.S. The photo was taken about a year ago, shortly after Margie moved to Arizona.