Dear Mama,

You prompted me today through a random thought to check on Margo, your good friend and "cancer buddy," and so I did. 

I saw that you and Margo were reunited today. 

I am so depressed for yet another family's loss of their sweet matriarch.  Yet I know that just like you, Margo was an amazing person so full of love for others and willing to serve in any manner Heavenly Father asked of her, I have no doubts that she is happily reunited with her Heavenly Father. 

She was my early morning seminary teacher when I was a senior in high school.  We all know I was not easy to love at that time, but Margo wrote me a sweet and encouraging note about where I could find happiness.  She reached out to me at a time when I wasn't open to the church or many authority figures and just let me know I was loved and I was important.  I still have that note and I smile every time I come across it in my scriptures.

Then, less than ten years later, her family hosted a Christmas party for the singles branch of the Tulsa Oklahome East Stake of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.  It was that night at Margo's home that I met my future eternal soulmate.

And of course, how could I forget the special friendship you two had?  I was always touched when you talked of Margo sitting with you during your chemo treatments, and then when Margo was rediagnosed, how you gave her the cancer blanket that the church ladies gave to you to take to your treatments. 

A few weeks before you died, you told me that Margo had been diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer, unrelated to the breast cancer she had beat a few years before.  You were in hospice care, and she would be joining you soon, and you said that you knew that Heavenly Father allowed you to stay just a little bit longer so that you could help prepare Margo for what she was about to go through.

I imagine she must have given you the biggest hug this morning.  I am happy that you and your friend are together again, but I admit I am a little jealous.  I wish I could have hugged you, too.  I miss you so much, Mom. 

Please let Margo know I will pray for her family tonight.