So Long to a Friend

So this week I was given the news that a long time listener and friend had passed.

Now growing up Catholic I never knew you could actually be “friends” with a Nun. When you’re a kid Nuns are really really sacred, and in most cases they scared the hell out of me. I mean these are the messengers right to Jesus Christ, and when you’re a Ramblin’ Ray there’s some things that ya may want to hide from time to time.

Enter a woman I met at a Church benefit in Schererville, Indiana more than 20 years ago. Her name was Sister Shaun Mitchell. Honestly one of the most sincere caring people I have ever met in my life. She was a big country music fan, she loved Alan Jackson and would talk to me about him and his music all the time. As time would pass, we would keep in touch but she never let me go without a “play some Alan Jackson, he’s good you know”.

Sister lived a life that’s hard to fathom she was a servant to a calling that never wavered, she had many health problems that included dialysis, and later a kidney transplant. She had great amounts of pain and hospital stays in the last six years but you would never know it. It’s lesson that we can all learn from, that if you believe, if you have faith you will always persevere. Something that can get lost on a guy like me from time to time.

It’s been a tough few years for me, Sister Shaun knew my ex-wife Gina and loved my family. When I told her I was getting divorced she knew I was sad, when no one else did, or really no one else seemed to care. She would tell me that no matter what ” Jesus loved me” and he always would. And she did this with a firm voice enough for me to believe. And that was her beauty, no matter her pain she cared more about you than herself.

Her pain included a brother that never came home from Vietnam, we would talk about him from time to time and I think today she is finally with him — her questions about him finally answered and finally she is pain-free on a street of gold with her creator she so loved.

She loved my old friend Trish Biondo, and Trish loved her. I’m told that at her service the pictures of her US99.5 friends will be part of her remembrance, Sister Shaun also left her mark on US99.5 listeners, many of whom remembered her and my antics together on our Facebook page.

You can bet that Thursday I will make the service to say so long to an old friend, and as I traverse this crazy life I will remember her voice always reassuring me that no matter my mistakes, that someone up there is watching over me. I now know this as a fact.

Rest well my dear sweet sister, and as I used to ask you “Throw one down for me”.

RR