Sara in your words

I am shocked, saddened, and anxious about this news. My last couple of emails from Sara were on a down note; I never had a chance to answer them properly, but I figured she would pull out of it as she always has before.  God knows she had some bad breaks, seems unjust for the superior person that she is, and will always be in my mind.  I have known Sara (Sally back then) as a special friend from the fourth grade at West Side School in Marietta, Ga. right on through recent years. To me, and I think others in our little group of "Marietta Misfits" (You know who you are.), she was "the Girl who knows Everything", like Hermione in the Harry Potter tales.  And she retained that aura for all the years I knew her through to the present.  Several times she said things that took my breath away; as a prime example,  I remember one time, I think it was the fifth grade in 1953, on the school grounds at West Side, she said to me, "You know, Dan, that you can use a telescope to see into the distant past, but only on distant stars and galaxies, light years away."  She said that in her usual offhand way, like of course I already knew that, and of course I did not (I was Blown Away!), and she knew that too, though I tried not to show it!  I think she may have been the only person in Marietta in 1953 who knew that linkage between time and distance, and its implications; certainly the only fifth grader !  Marietta at that time was a society of Cultural Retards, making Sara (Sally Ector at the time) all the more remarkable.  She seemed out of place amongst us Provincial Bumpkins !  Thinking back on this some years later, I looked up what events in 1953 may have put her on this profound train of thought - there it was in the thesaurus -  Prof. Edwin Hubbell died in September 1953, and she must have read his obituary, or some other article about his life and work. I could go on for hours about things Sara said and knew back in the day, apparently absorbing new things instantly, which the rest of us were only slowly learning, and I imagine all you others (Marietta Misfits) could do the same, and we cherish the hope that Sara and her remarkable mind  will be with us a little longer, though I know we are all "Winding Down" and approaching the Great Divide, wondering what (if anything) comes next.  My early life experience, with significant contributions from Sara, and a few others, did much to start me on my own life journey, which has shown me that Life and the Universe are probably Not Bounded by what we now perceive, as it was certainly Not Bounded by what we as a species perceived as recently as 100 or so years ago. We grow and develop as Individuals and as a Species, the two being linked by something called Culture..  In science alone, we now know that the earth is Not just a flat blob of dirt, water, and rocks sitting on the back of a  Giant Turtle (named Herbert) as previously Thought and Taught, but a (warped) spherical orb in the Solar System, which is part of the known Universe which is Vast beyond our Grasp, billions of light years in all directions !  Thanks to Prof. Hubbell and others, we know that chemistry and physics, the elements, compounds, laws of motion, etc., were the same as here and now on Earth a billion years ago in innumerable galaxies a billion light years away (because the light from them we see now started on its journey to us a billion years ago, the speed of light being constant (a la Einstein))!!  The apparent miracles of Life we are beginning to understand using those same principles of chemistry, physics, and mathematics that we have used successfully to understand Dead Things (including viruses, which are not living but are Biological Zombies). Regarding mathematics, we have an abiding sense that 2 + 2 = 4 everywhere, independent of time and place, and thus all other "provable"  mathematical principles, will (probably) hold constant throughout the universe and whatever other universes may exist unbeknownst to us.  The Arts, particularly Music, give us a whole different "Non-Substantial" universe that we have discovered to explore and subsist in.   I have no doubt that Sara could have been a pianist of the first order if she had chosen to do so, and she is no slouch at the piano as it is; a few years ago she told me that she was still playing and taking lessons. Back in the Fifth grade Sara (Sally) was already an accomplished sight reader on the piano, and Mrs. Chilton, our teacher, often turned the class over to Sara, who played piano accompaniments while the rest of us attempted to sing (or surreptitiously engage in other nefarious mischief). I could go on indefinitely with this missive, as could all you others, but I will close now before her spirit invades my mind and kicks me in the (mental) butt, as she used to do regularly at West Side School in Marietta, Ga. so many years ago. Take Care, Everyone, and Beware of the Viral Zombies !! (and Fat, Flatulent, Stupid Presidents et al.) My Friends, Every One!