Missy, Everybody's Little Sister for Quite a Few Years!

One of my warmest memories of Missy is of the year that we were at Schneider School in Columbia, South Carolina.  She was in the first grade, and I was in the sixth grade, and after her class let out, she'd come upstairs to talk to the big kids in sixth grade.  I don't remember exactly how this started, but I think she thought that if her sister were in the building, of course she should come in and say hello.  She always assumed that because she was so welcoming, she would be welcomed, and she was.  We had a teacher that year who seemed to understand that part of education is feeling connected to other people, and the teacher liked Missy as much as the kids did.  So she'd let Missy come in and show us her drawings and give us the scoop on what was happening in first grade.  Missy became everybody's little sister that year, and we always looked forward to her visits.  Years later my friends from that sixth grade class attended a different high school, so I'd see them only occasionally.  But when we met, they'd always ask me how I was doing, and then they'd ask, "And how's Missy?"  After all, she was their sister, too!

This memory of Missy represents some of the qualities that I loved so much in her.  She was very friendly and very warm.  She loved her family, and she was always welcoming more people into her family.  None of us will ever forget the special brightness she brought into our lives.