My normal reaction to departures from my life has always been to pour myself a Gulpee-size helping of denial.

This week, I’m lugging around a Thermal Jug of the stuff.

My friend Pat Reynolds has finally made good on her threat to retire to Tucson.  She of the Yorkielaw fame, who has sat with me when I cried, saying exactly what I needed to hear.  Pat intervened with a judge or two when I got out of line.  She persuaded me to venture to North God’s Country.  She taught me that there’s nothing a determined woman cannot do, including working a keyboard with long nails or going to court in open-toe shoes while still being considered respectable.

In her SUV with the TLC LAW plates and her beloved Ciara on board, no doubt strapped into the front seat, Pat headed west just in time to escape a renewed blast of winter as the wind blows its fierce breath onto Kansas City.  I cannot bear to journey to the little office that I rented down the hall from hers.  Knowing we’d have breakfast at Ginger Sue’s where she’d give me her feisty and perfect opinion on the affairs of the day and the happenings in the Clay County bar livened my journeys to Liberty.  She reads my blog, e-mails amusing commentary on life and our fellow practitioners, and cuts through the nonsense in most situations to call it just as she sees it and as it probably really is.

I’m going to miss her more than I can articulate.  But I know she will be happier in the warmth of the southwest, in her lovely adobe house, in a community with no children and the perfect little patio for Ciara’s occasional peek out-of-doors.  Left to mourn her decampment:  One Missouri Mugwump, who depended on Pat Reynolds to help me cling to the barest bit of sanity left beneath the veneer.

But I won’t complain.  She got a two-bedroom condo and I plan to make good on my threat to visit, by and by, perhaps in time for the famous Arizona monsoons.  Fare the well, my friend.  Safe journeys.

It’s evening on the ninth day of the thirty-ninth month of My Year Without Complaining.  Storm’s coming.  Hunker down.  Life continues.