It was supposed to be a fun last day together.

And it was.

First, we traipsed through the hills, taking in the last of some of the most splendid views.

The creek, with its myriad flows and waterfalls came next, and, then finally, the city.

And, somewhere within the city, an airport.

But first, there was a large shopping mall.

And then they said they were hungry for dinner.

And, she ordered a lettuce salad, that appeared to have taken almost a half head of lettuce in the making thereof.

I poked fun at it, and she poked fun at my cheesy tater tot dinner, mainly, I suppose, because she thinks I act cheesy and resemble a tater tot.

And she tried to snitch some of my chocolate shake, but I didn’t let her have any of it.  (Later I wished I had.)

Because, maybe if I had, she would have felt too full, and her mini golf score wouldn’t have looked quite so nice compared to mine.

Or, she wouldn’t have been able to belly laugh quite so easily when my golf ball bounded clear past the putting board and skittered back towards the receptionist lady, who took shelter behind her till as I scampered after it.

But finally, we all were a bit tired, so we found some chairs and sat, quietly, hearts connected in phrases, and sometimes who paragraphs, even though no words were spoken out loud.

And then it was time to find the airport. 

And the bags seemed terribly heavy.

And the walk seemed ever so long.

And, then, goodbye.

And I thought it might be easier this time, since it wasn’t the first time. 

But it was harder.

And I started to cry a little, because she was, but I held it in mostly.

Until I saw her so far away, walking all alone, and waving me.

And then I found a bench, sat down on it, and let myself cry.  And I didn’t care what the people thought when they walked by.

And I still had the sniffles when we boarded the plane, and I looked dully out at the grey and dirty snow colored landscape.

But then we took off, and in a few minutes, we punched through the clouds.

And, just at that instant, the setting sun was level with the clouds, and turned them into a blanket of shining gold for as far as I could see.

Smooth, clean, clear, scintillating gold.

It seemed a beautiful goodbye then, and the beauty of it lasted all the way through, even until when we got to our car, and it had a flat tire, there in the airport parking lot and it was changed, even at that late hour. 

Because a life given in service is as shining gold to look upon and worth many hundreds of rubies.