Folks: 
 

I want to give you an update that wife Kathy, now in her final days having lost her gruesome and trying battle with alcoholism, against all predictions, survived last night peacefully and restfully under the loving Hospice comfort and care nurses at Missoula, MT’s St. Patrick’s Hospital.  Frankly, I attribute this continuum in strength to three things:  first, Kathy’s indomitable internal strength; secondly, God’s failure to get Her kitchen in order (I am convinced that Kathy will not budge until that occurs [witness K’s own kitchen signs: “Don’t Start With Me!  You Won’t Win!” and “Dinner Choices—Take It—Leave It”] She, God, has an incoming management problem!) and , thirdly (and I truly believe this to be most importantly), “y’all” having lit so many candles for her in the last 24 hours that she now simply does not want to leave…there are now over 100 (count ‘em!) candles burning nationwide in vigil and homage to her.

To be clear, Kathy’s condition is terminal.  Due to the ravages of her alcoholic condition, her liver and kidneys are now both in failure stages and, during her last days, she took so many tumbles in the middle of the night going to and fro that, in the course of one of her episodes, she fell and hit her head so hard that she now has a massive subdural cranial hematoma that is exacerbated by her alcohol-thinned blood that interferes with coagulation.  Simply stated, we are at the “game over” stage of her life.

Rather than retreat to despair and outrage at this cruel and unnecessary state of affairs, contrariwise, my thoughts lie firmly elsewhere.  They, of course, are first and foremost focused upon Kathy to make sure that we do everything possible to provide her a peaceful passage to the life beyond.  However, those thoughts extend much further…they reach out to others who are so similarly and terminally situated (by way of example, all flowers directed to Kathy, on my instructions, are to be delivered to others at St Pats in need and who need their own comfort and care);  those thoughts also extend further to all those in our sphere who are suffering from the poorly understood (read “totally understood”) alcoholism and drug addictive diseases, for whom there seems to be no hope, but only despair; and they reach out even further to all humans in pain, for we all breathe the same air and, in a very real sense, their pain is our ingested pain whether we know and recognize it or not.

So, that having been said, today, if you have not already done so, in honor to Kathy (who, by her life’s deeds and work, is deserving of that honor) I ask each and every one of you who read this message to “Light a Kandle for Kathy”; take a picture of that candle and send it to sjames@clausenlawgroup.com so that we can post it to our www.montanaextravaganza2015.blogsite.com blogsite that we have set up to receive your images and that, there, collectively, we can provide a series of eternal flames that will be forever viewable not only by my beloved Kathy, but also by all of the Kathy’s of the world who are in pain and in need of our love, care and support.

Individually, we are each straws in the wind, but, collectively, the powers that we can amass are indomitable.  So, join in our collective expression of love; light your own Kandle For Kathy; and know that, in doing so, your random act of kindness, when amassed with others doing the same thing, can ease the course of events.  No, we cannot bring the Kathy the we know and respect back to us (it is simply too late for that), but we can each take a moment to honor her life; we can each take a fresh breath air and exhale in her honor;  and we can all Light a Kandle For Kathy (whether she be mine or of your own) and, in doing so, emit light to the positive side of humanity—a side that receives so little if no recognition in this manic age myopically focused on sensationalizing doom and destruction. 

Your lit candle will light up Kathy’s darkest hour, for which I thank you from the bottom of my now broken heart.

As for me, in this now darkest of hours, I have now lit a second Kandle For Kathy;  just downloaded that classic 1908 Kenneth Grahame novel “The Wind In The Willows”;  and am now headed out to St Pats to read aloud and share with her that novel of “Bother” with her where it all matters in the light of the day.

Best to all,

Rock Creek Ron

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