May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest...*
Another great sequoia had been felled in the great forest of letters...not as well known as the recent losses in the world, but every bit as gifted. From the very beginning of her battle with cancer, Laura Jane wore an armor of bravery and courage like none I have ever seen. We were spiritual companions; her soul was as deep as any I have ever known. Her gentle demeanor combined with her deep soul were exquisitely expressed in her writing, which became her vehicle for Going Home. Since January about six months after her diagnosis, she shared her thoughts in prose and poetry on Substack in her blog entitled Three Corners. https://laurajanepittman.substack.com/p/whose-journey-is-it-anyway. In her words: Three Corners is a place to explore how mind, body, spirit work in harmony to complete this life’s journey.
Like her wordsmith hero, Andrea Gibson, LJ committed to spend her last nine months journaling her way through the battle, and as a result we are left with a magnificent yet somber guide through her cancer journey. For me, LJ's writing was even more poignant than Gibson, because she carried with her a faith in God, an understanding of the Trinity and a belief in peace that passes all understanding like none I have ever witnessed. She was fiercely devoted to her husband and her three children, and together they walked, sometimes crawled, this path to the end...which came this morning at 4:30.
Just as she would have wanted it, on the breath of dawn, Laura Jane "broke the surly bonds of earth and saw the face of God."** The grief in that precious room is more than I can fathom right now. And so I offer you these words which I believe she would want us all to remember from her mentor Andrea Gibson last summer as Gibson came to the end of her brutal journey.
"Dying is the opposite of leaving. When I left my body, I did not go away. That portal of light was not a portal to elsewhere, but a portal to here. I am more here than I ever was before. I am more with you than I ever could have imagined. So close you look past me when wondering where I am."
I love you Laura Jane and will never forget our times together. I will be there for your family and help them to remember that you will be with them till the end of the age.
*spoken by Horatio to his dying friend Prince Hamlet in William Shakespeare’s play Hamlet (Act 5, Scene 2).
**John Gillespie Magee Jr. from "High Flight"
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