Not too long ago I wrote about the Finley wondering about whether our friend Betty would be alive the next day.

This afternoon came the moment when the answer became no. No, honey, Betty won’t be there next time.

She slipped away this afternoon, precisely at the moment when we had all begun to wonder just how long she would have to suffer. It doesn’t make her having gone any easier, but it does make it easier to explain to the girls that Betty was an athlete. Betty was a force. She was spry and spunky nearly to the end, and so it is the she that she was as she felt pain and limitation that we say goodbye to.

It’s the wry, raucous laughing Betty that we remember and celebrate.

That she, that vibrant, infectious she, that one will always be there wagging an incorrigible finger and and saying “Gee whiz” as we celebrate holidays and milestones.

We love you, Betty.