We drove to Newton, Kansas last week to attend Cookie’s funeral. We have known Cookie and David Weibe since 1997 when we went to India to work at Woodstock School. She was the staff “buddy” assigned to us to help us get settled into the community. It was a memorable Saturday when we piled into Bunty’s little Ambassador taxi for the drive to down the mountain to Dehradun and Paltan Bazaar. Woodstock and India were home to me because I had grown up there but returning as an adult proved to be an important experience in which I grew and deepened my relationship with India and the understanding of myself.
Cookie was assigned to work with the journalism students in producing the school yearbook that year, The Whispering Pine, which brought her and the students to the Alumni /Development Office to search for interesting bits of history and photographs for their project. It was the 50th year of India’s independence and they titled their annual “Jai Hind” – hurrah India. All in black and white it was a masterful piece. I was struck by Cookie’s energy and dedication to the task.
We did not have much contact with Cookie and David again for over a decade. They returned to Newton, their home, and both pursued graduate degrees in preparation for returning to Woodstock at some future date. In 2000 we also returned to the U.S. but in 2007 I was offered the opportunity to direct a study abroad program in Delhi for American students. The Weibe’s also returned in 2009 to take up positions at Woodstock. But within the first year Cookie realized she was seriously ill and contacted me in Delhi to help find an oncologist who could see her. They stayed with us for five weeks during which time the diagnosis came - advanced ovarian cancer with possible secondary uterine cancer. The medical care available in Delhi was surprisingly sophisticated and she and David felt they were getting accurate and state-of-the-art-treatment. However, once they saw how serious her situation was they chose to return to the U.S. to be closer to their family and other friends and the support system in their Mennonite church.
Before Cookie left Woodstock she wrote a piece entitled, “You Might Not Have to Die,” which was her treatise on life and death. The title comes from her great love for hiking in the Himalayas and her analysis of what an accident in the mountains could mean – in her words:
When hiking in the Himalayas in the 90′s, I categorized the drop-offs at the edge of the trail according to the probable end result:
- They might not have to carry you (i.e., you might not even get injured).
- You might not have to die (your injuries might not be fatal)
- They might not find you (self-explanatory)
She went on to write eloquently and lovingly of her goals and philosophy of life and death. She listed her positions:
1. God will not allow anything to happen to me that will not further his kingdom.
2. It’s Okay to die.
3. A long life and a full life are not necessarily the same thing.
4. My life isn’t any shorter today than it was yesterday (before possible dread disease)
5. My goal is to empower my loved ones to move on.
In the next fifteen months Cookie wrote a blog about what was happening in her life. She was candid, funny, poignant and philosophical. Hundreds of people around the world followed her blog. She chronicled her experiences with the health care system, with no insurance, with the results of “Obama Care” which she credited with allowing her to stay alive and receive treatment for as long as she did. She explored the genetic reasons that might have led to her unusually severe disease. She repeatedly listed the things she wanted people to pray for … lessons in talking to God. She sent good news and bad news and through it all was graceful and clear.
In May she wrote:
My prognosis is very bad.
· Pray for a miracle – it may take a miracle to meet that first grandchild in the first week of August.
· Pray for pain management to work in order to make the best possible use of the time I have left.
· Praise God for all the blessings, yes blessings that we are receiving in the midst of this “horrible” experience.
She did meet that grandchild, a grandson named Cassius. She was lucid until the end, blogging and Tweeting up until three weeks before her death. She went quietly with a smile and thumbs-up sign to her beloved David. She was ready. No one had to carry her out, she went willingly into eternity leaving us behind to marvel at her fortitude and determination.
We drove through torrents of rain and wind to reach her service in Newton. It is 721 miles from Evanston to Newton, across Illinois and Iowa to Des Moines, south through Missouri to Kansas City, and off onto a wide, well maintained state road toward Wichita. The morning of the service was clear and crisp. The prairie is rolling with outcroppings of white sand stone, dozens of hawks lined the highway, facing white breasted into the morning sun. Like sentinels leading us.
She had selected 24 hymns for her funeral. David pared the list to 7. The plain pine casket was open. She looked serene. The singing was glorious – many part harmonies in the Mennonite church that knows how to sing and how to stand by to aid whomever is in need. We are sorrowful but so much richer for having had Cookie in our lives. The bell in the tower tolled 57 times, one for each year of her life, while they carried the casket to the hearse.
Farewell Cookie – although it seems unnecessary to say because I know you are doing just that - Rest in Peace.
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