On March 29,1928 a tiny baby girl was placed in her mother's arms and the nurse said, "Here's your Tootsie." While we were growing up, that is what she was called, although she was named Gladys. In the seventy years she was on this earth she became brave, bold, beautiful and beloved.
Today, as these last remains of a daughter, sister, wife, mother, grand and great grandmother are scattered to the four winds and given back to the earth from whence she came, we know that she will live forever.... Not only in the Heaven, that God has reserved for those who love and believe in Him, but she will become a part of the earth we dwell upon.
The ever-prevailing winds shall lift her from the earth and carry her to places we shall never know of. She will soar with the Eagle and nest with the Dove. She shall lie with the flowers in the field. Through time and space, she will forever be a part of the wind the envelopes the earth; always present, yet unconquerable and unrestrained. Some times calm and gentle, yet able to change in a moment to a whirlwind of movement, as she could in life.
When I see the wind lifting the dry fall leaves, spinning them effortlessly in space, lithely exhibiting intricate patterns, I will remember a little girl, dancing in a make believe princess gown, pretending she was at a great ball.
She was as the wind can be; both tender and strong. It can lull a child to sleep in his cradle, yet in unchained fury it can level the greatest obstructions in its path. A measure of each enabled her to know when to conquer with strength and when to tender her strength with mercy.
She shall forever be on the timeless wind that derives it's strength and energy from the cosmos of the universe, being one with nature, as a man's body should be one with his spirit.
We shall remember her when the summer breeze softly stirs the flowers in the field; when the thunder claps and the lightning streaks across the sky and the wind swept rain drops wash the earth for another day. WE WILL REMEMBER!
So fly on the wind beloved one. It is everlasting.... It dies, yet it lives ...even as man's thoughts and deeds cannot perish after death, but live on in those he has touched.
Death may conquer the body, but the soul will soar into infinity and Be As The Wind!
Copyright © 1999 Carol Bouche' Ottlinger