Mikes Place

By Michael L. Craner

I know I have been absent from my columns for a while, but being the webmaster does give me certain rights to re-emerge without warning. ;) Other projects, especially life, has kept me hopping. A new addition to our family, becoming a boy scout leader as well as holding down a full time job and being on call 24/7 keeps me busy. However I have to say something this month regarding the loss of Jacquie MacGibbon to cancer, who was the sister of Mary, our editor.

Jacquie MacGibbon also known as K’am Treshelle and a few other aliases to her friends and family was a good friend of mine. Not the kind I call often or calls me, but someone I was able to connect to on some level. We began writing a book together over a year and a half ago. My projects and schedule as well as events in her life stalled the process, but the book is more important to me now than ever. Her contributions to Pencilstubs are notable, but the ones she made to society are even more so. For twenty eight years she helped the deaf, she loved life and the outdoors and was a loving and fair mother and grandmother. I never knew her to speak ill of another person.

Accepting, and creative just as all of the Carrolls I have met, Jacquie was, and is an inspiration to me. I don’t mourn the loss of a person anymore as much as I do the effect they had on our lives. Through my own past on relatives I have found peace and comfort in finding they are closer to me than ever and I know such is true of Jacquie now. It’s hard for me to relate my sadness at this loss, but I hope that Mary understands.

Finishing our book is more a priority to me than it ever was, though somehow I think I knew it would come to this. Now I know what dedications are for, because were it not for Jacquie, I know my part in this book would never have gone as far as it did, or as far as I can hope it will, but the only thing certain in life is change, and we must learn to adapt.