For our friend…

Marianne was always late to her hair appointment.

Not because she was careless or inconsiderate, and not because she couldn’t keep track of time. She was late because she was a doer. Over the years, she’d come rushing in from a gymnastics obligation for her eldest son, a ballet commitment for her middle daughter, or after dropping off snacks for the football team for her youngest. She’d squeeze in delivering a Cabi order to a client, meeting her husband, and still somehow make time for Mahjong with her girlfriends.

She didn’t waste a second—she lived every one of them. Fully. Presently. Intentionally.

Marianne was a wife, a mother, a teacher, a dancer, a friend—a woman of style and taste. The “little” details mattered to her. But even those words only begin to scratch the surface. There are never enough words to capture a life that brought so much joy, so much laughter, and so much light to so many people. She gave advice and support freely, and she showed up—again and again—for the people she loved.

Marianne was always late. And yet, in all the ways that mattered, she was always right on time.

In 2015, when she was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), she called me to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. I shaved her head to help ease the discomfort of the rapid shedding caused by chemotherapy. We both cried. I told her I had shaved many heads in my career because of cancer—and that I had given every one of those people their first haircut when it grew back. I told her she was not allowed to break my record.

She laughed—and she didn’t break it.

What she did was nothing short of extraordinary. The resilience, the grit, the stubbornness. The faith—above all, the faith. That day in the hospital, she told me all she wanted was to watch her children grow up. She was determined, against all odds, to see that through.

And she did.

She saw all three of her children graduate college. She watched them begin their careers. She saw her eldest get married.

I cut her hair five days before that wedding. It was a hard day. She felt weak. She felt defeated. And then she said, “I have to get it together.”

I walked her to her car, and we said, “I love you.” I told her I couldn’t wait to hear about the wedding and see the pictures.

She never got to tell me about it herself. But I carry so much peace—and so much joy—knowing she was there.

In a perfect world, she would still be here. We wouldn’t have to miss her.

I once read something that has stayed with me: Grief is the deepest proof that love existed—that something beautiful once touched your life.

That love doesn’t disappear. It transforms. It lingers in echoes of laughter, in the warmth of old memories, in the quiet moments when you still reach for what is no longer there.

And in time, healing comes—not because you have forgotten, but because you have learned to carry both love and loss, together.

Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord,
and let Your perpetual light shine upon her.
May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace.
Amen