Memories of Mandi- Day 4

     "Hey, how are ya?" I was ringing up a co-worker for a few things at the end of his shift. I pressed Cancel on the Credit Card machine without asking if he wanted his receipt- he never did.
     "Eh. This day's gonna be bad." He signed his receipt and handed it back to me with a sigh.
     "What's bad about it?" I asked, curious. I realized a moment too late that the question was probably a nosy one, but he responded without a qualm, listing a few annoying tidbits, and then adding: "... and I have a funeral tomorrow."
     My head snapped up. "Mandi?" I asked. He nodded.
     "She was my friend's best friend." He said briefly.
     Immediately two of Mandi's best friends popped into my head, and I asked, "Which friend is that?"
He surprised me by coming out with a name I only vaguely recognized, and I thought, How many best friends did this girl have?
     I thought about it for the remainder of the day. I thought and thought and thought, and I came to this conclusion: Everyone was Mandi's best friend. 
     There was never a person Mandi wasn't kind to. She was always surrounded by all kinds of people. She was a Cowboy boots and Four-Wheelers girl, and her friends were that and everything else.
     Mandi was known everywhere. Not by everyone, the way a Student Body President or other such person is known, but everywhere. There wasn't a corner she didn't permeate. There wasn't one kind of people she missed.
     She was everywhere.
     I thought on this all day, and still I didn't truly realize the extent of it until I went to the viewing this evening. As I walked out of the building, wiping tears from my eyes, there was a line of people sitting outside, reminiscing and talking quietly... and I thought to myself, I had no idea she even knew all these people... and they probably had no idea she knew me. 
     I saw a friend from school I'd met in a couple of my classes, and I went and gave him a hug. We talked for a moment, and he said, "You know, she's not hurting anymore."
     "Yeah," I sniffed, "She's probably happier there than she would be here."
     "She's probably on a Four-Wheeler-"
     "In the mud-"
     "In a hole-"
     "Getting dirty." I supplied, and laughed.
     "Exactly." He smiled at me.
     And I realized that they really did know her. And love her. And wish her the best in all their ways, whether they be Christian, Jewish, Atheist, or simply non-religious. They all imagined her in their ideas of Heaven, with all the goodwill and love they could muster. And why? Well, because she's wonderful, of course, but I think, in large part, it was because every one of them not only loved her, but felt loved by her. There was never one moment when she said or did anything that made anyone wonder if she really cared.
     Mandi has a gift. A gift for loving every living thing on this earth, human or not. Sometimes, the greater gift is loving humans; sometimes that is more difficult than anything else. But Mandi did it! Shamelessly and fearlessly, she did it, and we all felt it.
     Take a moment. Can you feel it too?