Tried to go to sleep tonight, but I don’t know if it is coming. Thinking a lot about Mom . I keep thinking of her last year and how scared she must have been, especially when she started to feel the cancer return.

Mom instilled in me a love of reading. I’ve gotten through a lot of books in the last 5 weeks or so – the latest 3 by Koontz, latest by Sanford, and the latest by Patterson. I read the first few pages of a book I thought I’d not read by Janet Evanovich. Now I’m stuck between books. I have several by an author, Harlan Corben, that Mom had been reading for 18-24 months before she got sick. I am reluctant to read those, though. It is the last author Mom tried to turn me on to and I’m never going to get that again. There was a connection with us and reading. She got me reading King, Cornwell, Evanovich, Balladuci, Grisham, Connolly, Cook. I got her reading Patterson, McCammon, Deaver, Koontz. I think we both discovered Kellerman at about the same time. Amy got us reading Reichs and Hoag. I know that it will still happen – that Amy or I will read something by an author we’ve never read, and we’ll be hooked. I also know that Amy and I can talk about the books we’ve read. I still miss talking books with Mom. One of the billion things I miss about her.

The Indigo Girls released an album of rarities (covers, bootlegs, etc.). On it is a song Amy Ray wrote as a tribute for a friend of hers who died of ovarian cancer. Her friend had been an environmental activist, trying to make the world a healthier place. She ended up being poisoned by the pollution she fought to eliminate. I first heard the song yesterday and it transfixed me. I know that at the end, when the chemo didn’t work and Mom made her decision not to fight, she simply wanted to go easy.


let me go easy
------------------------------------------------------------------------

come pleasure me again
i'm so tired of digging in
i've done my share i don't need to win
just let me go easy

for two years my body fights
at this point it don't seem right
just to do it out of spite
and keep hanging on

come on let me go easy
won’t you let me go easy
you let me go right now

seen the numbers dwindling
of my enemies and my friends and
still i know it never ends
so i'm passing you this torch

fight the greed and the federals
fight the need and the toxic spills and
drink from that wishing well
but may it never quench your thirst

(let me go easy)
come on let me go easy
oh would you let me go easy
you let me go right now

(let me go easy)
come on let me go easy
oh won't you let me go easy
you let me go right now

so when you get to laytonville
for the tears and the fare thee wells
for a moment stand real still
and you'll feel me moving on

go ahead with your plans
oh you won't be seeing me again
you'll feel me in the hand
the hand that holds the plow

(let me go easy)
come on let me go easy
oh would you let me go easy
you let me go right now

(let me go easy)
come on let me go easy
oh would you let me go easy
you let me go right now

words and music by amy ray