#MicroblogMondays: She'll be missed :(

When you've been around the blogging community as long as I have, sadly, inevitably, you wind up saying a permanent goodbye to some of the friends and acquaintances you've made along the way. 

(I still think about Emilie of Lemmondrops, whose husband made a final, poignant post on her blog to announce her death at a far-too-young age on Christmas Eve 2008, early in my blogging career.  Her baby would be would be almost through high school now -- yikes!) 

Earlier this week, I learned (via Facebook) that fellow blogger and CNBC friend -- known to many of us here in the CNBC corner of the blogging world as Bamberlamb from "It's Inconceivable" -- died on Valentine's Day (Feb. 14th), after living with cancer for the past several years.   

I got to know Bamberlamb via her blog, and also through Mali at No Kidding in NZ, who knew her for many years, pre-blogging, through their volunteer work for the Ectopic Pregnancy Trust in the UK. (She's written her own lovely tribute on her blog, here.)  When I joined the Gateway Women online community about 10? years ago (now called Childless Collective), I was delighted to find Bamberlamb there. When Jody Day created a sub-group there for Childless After Babyloss in 2021, and asked me and Bamberlamb to co-host, I couldn't think of anyone else I'd rather share the job with. 

(I was curious just how long I'd known Bamberlamb -- I thought at least 10 years, possibly longer. There wasn't an easy way to see just how long she'd been writing her blog -- no complete list of blog posts to click on, as there is on mine. I wound up clicking back and back and back on individual posts -- hitting "previous post" on each one! -- until there were no more. So far as I can tell, she started her blog in/around January 2016 -- and I found a few of my own comments on those early posts too. So it hasn't been QUITE 10 years that I've known her, more like 9, but that's still a long time!)   

Bamberlamb was feisty, funny, frank, and often hilariously profane. She loved her husband, their "tin tent" (camper trailer, or "caravan," as the Brits call it) and animals. (I knew things were not going well when she had to rehome the little dog she'd been fostering and then adopted.)  I had a standing invitation to visit her, if and when I ever got to the UK. She promised to take me to Stratford-on-Avon to see Shakespeare's cottage, and on a tour of traditional British pubs.  

Sadly, that's not going to happen now. But if/when I ever find myself in England, I'll be sure to raise a glass at a pub in Bamberlamb's memory while I'm there.  

Bamberlamb was proud of her Irish roots. Her funeral will be held on St. Patrick's Day. Her husband has asked her friends to wear her favourite colour, purple.  I won't be able to attend the funeral, but I will be wearing purple (instead of the traditional green) that day for her. 

There's a saying in the Jewish community, when someone passes away: "May their memory be a blessing."  In response to Bamberlamb's death, I saw someone posting simply, "Her memory is a blessing."  

Yes, it is.  She will be missed.  

You can find more of this week's #MicroblogMondays posts here.