Rev. Ms. Nancy Patricia Griffin Hughes, 1932 – 2019. Foto from one provided to the public by the family for her obituaries in various newspapers.
This letter was written to the family and friends of Nancy Hughes, the mother of my ex-wife Gwen and grandmother to our two children, Dylan (formerly Morgan) and Kathryn, aka “Kate.” Although she passed in June of this year, her family elected to celebrate her transitions this past October at a wake they dubbed Momfest, held out at the Hughes family cabin at Willow Lake outside Lynchburg, Virginia.
Had hoped to attend and read a version of this letter, and was unable to do so. My printer wouldn’t work, didn’t have everyone’s email addresses, and didn’t wish to burden my ex-wife with reading my letter out loud for me at such an emotional gathering nor make copies to hand out to people. I think she emailed it forward to her siblings, but not everyone in the family knew of the letter. So now this letter is shared here this Xmas Eve for anyone to read. For Nancy was a Gift for the whole world.
Goodbye, Nancy. May the Afterlife be the journey you always imagined it to be. Thank you for sharing your life with so many people from Egypt to Tibet, from Canada to Ireland, from France to all over the United States and elsewhere. Here’s my letter as follows:
October 2019
Hello Everyone,
Once upon a long time ago, Nancy Patricia Griffin Hughes invited me to call her Nancy, and so I did. She grew on me quickly, she did, and soon experienced what a remarkable person Nancy was. Yes, Nancy was amazing. She was a visionary and a spiritual Magi. She was a shepherdess of flocks turned loose across woods and fields, flocks even unbuckled from the Bible Belt. Nancy was, in her own modest way, in her very own quiet, smiling, gentle Dalai Lama kind of way, a worker of flowers and upturned earth, a woman gifted with vast patience, a person steeped in the practices of being humble, and in silent observation of the interlocking and unlocking of the many relationships swirling all around her.
She watched without waiting as she had somehow mastered the long view, and she watched with quiet love. I’m sure she had her human flaws and inner contradictions, of course, for we all do. We all do. Nancy’s legacy, however, what she achieved and generated in spite of so many challenges, is what calls forth to be honored. I feel blessed to have ever met her, and am grateful to have met all of you. For those who don’t know me or haven’t seen me in many years, my name is William, as in William Dudley Bass. Originally from the Farmville/Rice area and now Seattle, WA, I was Gwen’s partner in life and love for 18 years, and her husband for the last 16 of those years. We’re good friends still.
Nancy would sit down, well, actually, I sat down next to her as she held court from her comfy chair, and share metaphysical teachings and experiences with me. I could speak with her about almost anything: prayer, meditation, magic, astral travel, dreamwork, rituals, paranormal and psychic phenomena, UFOs, ghosts, healing, all of those things. She addressed them with a sense of humor, too, but always laughing along with someone or at herself. She didn’t ever laugh at others at their expense, altho now and then she would make a certain face, squint beneath arched eyebrows, and announce she certainly had her “opinions,” tho often she kept them to herself. Around me, anyway. For me, well, I looked up to her back then as more of a teacher in these matters of the soul.
When Gwen and I thruhiked the Appalachian Trail all the way from Georgia to Maine back in 1991, Nancy served as our Trail Mother and Logistics Chief. She mailed heavy boxes of resupplies to us out on the Trail, packages Gwen & I had already put together. There were over 20 such mail drops, maybe even 24, but each took some work. And she was our go-to Chief Communicator back in those pre-cell fone days, too.
My own mother died back in November of 2006 after a long struggle with cancer. The funeral was held at Sharon Baptist Church in rural Prince Edward County. To my surprise and deep appreciation, Hoc & Nancy showed up as people gathered outside the church. I went over to hug them, and when Nancy hugged me I burst into tears. Took me by surprise. She just held me until I regained composure and thanked them both for being there. The encounter was unexpected, and, yes, one I have cherished ever since.
Nancy, at least when she & I used to speak of such matters, was one for whom death is not an end but a new beginning, a passing on into the mysteries and wonders of the Afterlife. Immortality in the flesh was not for her. Eventually, she once told me, she would look forward to such new spiritual experiences. She was absolutely confident and utterly calm we shall all meet again in the Great Beyond.
And so we shall.
I love you all.
With gratitude, sorrow, & blessings,
William
William Dudley Bass
Published here this Tuesday 24 December 2019
Seattle, Washington
Cascadia
USA
NOTES:
Nancy’s Obituary in The News & Advance, the “daily newspaper of record” for Lynchburg & surrounding towns & counties in the Upper James River Valley of the Commonwealth of Virginia: https://www.newsadvance.com/obituaries/griffin-hughes-nancy-patricia/article_e749722d-0c26-5d4f-8afa-dc85a7df2bbe.html.
Copyright © 2019 by William Dudley Bass. All Rights Reserved by the Author & his Descendants until we Humans establish Wise Stewardship over and for our Earth and Solarian Commons. Thank you.