Celebrate This Week: Remembering Jan

Join us each weekend for Celebrate This Week with Ruth Ayres.

When we pause to celebrate, we find the joy.

 

   A week filled with moments to celebrate and remember.

It's been a rough January with too much rain, too many dark, cloudy days, and never enough sun. We know that winter means mostly rain for us (we loved our bit of snow for Christmas this year), but somehow we forget in the splendor of a Pacific Northwest summer that January and rain will come again.

Yesterday a dear friend in our small congregation died. My heart is heavy. I ache for her family, her friends, and all who knew her. Jan is one of those people who lived the good life. She was diagnosed with multiple myeloma more than a decade ago. Her diagnosis forced her to retire earlier than she had anticipated, but she showed us that life doesn't end when you get a cancer diagnosis. 

She and her husband, Jack, started a memoir writing group with friends from our congregation and community. I loved reading her story of staying overnight in the BYU library with a group of friends. This story gave me a peek into her life as a college student when I was just in elementary school.

When I visited her in rehab earlier this month, I was impressed by the young medical personnel surrounding her who spoke to her with such respect. They knew that Dr. Woolley was a pioneer who chose to enter medicine at a time when few women made that choice. She was my daughter's pediatrician and knowing her influenced Sara's choice to become a physician assistant.

Her illness did not keep her grounded as she and Jack were always planning their next trip. The trips were always planned around her treatment and when she could be away for a bit. And having cancer didn't keep her from continuing to learn and grow. On one of my recent visits to her, I had to leave because her piano teacher arrived with lunch for Jan and her husband. 

Her gentle demeanor and soft voice will be remembered by many who fought this battle with her. I loved hearing her stories of those who sat beside her for chemotherapy and those who ministered to her. She was frequently the one doing the ministering as she listened and loved all around her.

We were joyful when she could join our women's meeting at church and missed her and prayed for her on the few occasions when she was absent. She will leave a giant hole in our hearts for she was one who lived the gospel and loved the Lord. Heaven is a richer place now that Jan Woolley has arrived.