I tried and tried to write what was in my heart, but I found that what I wanted to say was more to Laura, than about Laura. So I'm afraid I don't have much to give you for your gathering. All I managed to come up with in the end was the few sentences below.
I first met Laura through her son Anton, while we were all playing EverQuest. He and I were fairly low level characters, and poor as such usually are, when this magnificent lady swooped down and presented him with a pair of marvelous (and costly) boots! Anton thanked her most fervently, then turned and introduced the lady as his mother! She spoke to me most graciously, and she seemed to me the most wondrous being I had yet met in that make-believe world.
I was attracted to Anton on EverQuest because of the quality of character he displayed within the game. He was generous, courageous, witty, and helpful to all. He invited me to visit his home, and while there I met "The Laura", aka "The Sanomy" in person! After I returned home, she and I began a correspondence through e-mail, and I quickly came to recognize in her the foundation of those same qualities I had so admired in her son.
On subsequent visits, Laura made me one of her family, and delighted in the left-handed thinking that we both shared. She inspired me with such vitality, such exuberance, and such a keen intelligence at an age when most people are content to let the candle burn low. She sent Death packing several times when a lesser mortal would have succumbed. When she had this most recent heart attack, I was hoping against hope that she would pull the rabbit out of the hat one more time, for I had only just begun to know her. To me she was larger than life, and her spirit remains undiminished by death.
"I honor the place in you in which the entire universe dwells.
I honor the place in you which is of love, of truth, or light, and of peace.
When you are in that place in you, and I am in that place in me,
We are one."
Namaste, Laura
