by Mary Jo
Today is Memorial Day, which honors those who have died in military service. As a child, my sibs and I would accompany my father to the city cemetery to place flags on the graves of military veterans. Today, all honor to those who have served.
It’s rather fitting to use this day to wind up our week of mourning for Jo Beverley. It's time for the Word Wenches to return to regular programming, including a more somber continuation of the tenth anniversary of this blog. (I can imagine Jo saying crisply that it's time to pull up our socks and get back to work. <G>)
But today, as a last memorial, we wanted to post a few pictures of Jo, including several given by her family. Here's a nice one taken the day her older son married our Melissa, and she's holding an armful of Cabbage Patch Kids. The Kids are a Beverley family tradition and go to many family events. Jo sometimes made costumes for them. Above on the right is a picture of three Cabbage Patch Kids, and they're ready to party!
Jo loved to travel, and here's a great picture of her and author Barbara Samuel sharing a camel at Ayers Rock (Uluru) in the middle of Australia, and perhaps the center of the world. Both had been speakers at a Romance Writers of Australia conference. (That's a very regal camel. <G> Picture courtesy of Barbara Samuel.)
After returning to the UK, Jo and her husband Ken would often spend some weeks in the winter visiting Spain, which makes perfect sense to anyone who has ever experienced a winter in England! Ken took this lovely picture.
This shot was taken by Cara/Andrea as Jo signed at an RWA literacy event. I like the color coordination between the fan and her jacket.
And here's my favorite picture of all, contributed by Ken Beverley, showing the two of them in Malaga, Spain. Because what romance writer doesn't want to spend her life with her very own knight in shining armor?
We've spent the last week sharing our thoughts and memories of Jo so thoroughly that it doesn't feel if she's really gone. She's just in the next room, drinking wine with Edith Layton and Georgette Heyer.
I'll finish with this lovely piece posted on the original memorial blog by Jeannette:
Written by Henry Scott-Holland
Death is nothing at all. I have only slipped away into the next room. I am I and you are you.Whatever we were to each other, that we are still. Call me by my old familiar name.
Speak to me in the easy way you always used. Put no difference into your tone. Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow. Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes we always enjoyed together. Play, smile, think of me, pray for me. Let my name be ever the household word that it always was. Let it be spoken without effort, without the ghost of a shadow in it. Life means all that it ever meant. It is the same as it ever was. There is absolute unbroken continuity.
What is death but a negligible accident? Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight? I am waiting for you for an interval somewhere very near, just around the corner.
All is well. Nothing is past; nothing is lost. One brief moment and all will be as it was before. How we shall laugh at the trouble of parting when we meet again!
Until we meet again, Jo. Save some of that wine and dark chocolate for me!
Mary Jo