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As planned by husband Sven and friends too numerous to count, a glorious Memorial for our beloved Mary was celebrated Sunday night, October 7, her 47th birthday, at Prairie Hill School. The gym was transformed by the work of many, many hands into a beautiful, glowing hall, filled with flowers and candlelight, a montage of Mary’s life in phtographs, an enormous silken parachute draped from the ceiling and walls as backdrop for the presentations that evening.

A warm, inviting environment was thus created for the outpouring of song, music, dancing, sharing of memories and stories,even Mary’s favorite jokes, all tributes from the hearts and spirits of those who truly loved and esteemed Mary, her work, and the unique, genuine connection each felt with her.

The evening was so Mary! I felt her presence throughout, knowing she was groovin’ on all the music, the joy and laughter, telling us not to be sad on her account. As her mother it was an evening in which my heart swelled with pride as well as with so many other emotions as the tributes kept coming, often from people I had never met before. The realization of what Mary had created in terms of being of service to so many through her music and just being herself was a very comforting gift, and will continue to be in the months and years ahead.

I thank you for accompanying us on this very intense journey these past 15 months or so. Your kindness, love, and compassion have been palpable at times and a source of nourishment and enrichment always as we come to terms with Mary’s absence from this physical world. Nevertheless, I have no doubt whatsover that she will continue her work on the other side as well as continue to penetrate and inspire our lives and our work on this side until we too achieve transcendence. And then she will be there, laughing and singing, to help us across.

This will be my last posting. I will keep the website up for another month or so to encourage those who wish to communicate further. It has been a great honor to serve as your ’scribe.’ Wishing all of you ever greater joy, grace, light and love as you continue on your journeys, wherever they may take you.

Suzanne/Mom

Dear Ones,

Our Mary has graduated this life with the highest honors. She passed over to Spirit quietly and rather unexpectedly at home, a mere 24 hours after returning from LA where she worked with a healer and helped her uncle Bill celebrate his 55th birthday. Living life fully up to the very last.

What a teacher she has been to so many of us, including me. She taught us to take risks joyfully, to folloiw one’s dharma or life purpose wherever that takes one, to live with joy, and to find/create beauty in the ordinary. How she loved shiny, beautiful things, be it jewelry, scarves, clothing, flowers, dishes. Life was always brighter after a visit with her.

That doesn’t mean life was always easy for her. She experienced many challenges and difficulties that I believe tempered her steel core, covered usually in a velvet glove, but a steel core nevertheless. Her lessons were especially poignant this past year as her health was increasingly comprimised despite the best of medical and complinentary treatments.

Just as she taught us how to live, she taught us how to die–consciously, courageously, and with great integrity.

The community outpouring of support and ‘love in action’ was incredible prior to and following Mary’s death. Child care, meals, running errands, whatever needed doing was met. Sven and his carpenter friends built a cedar coffin.

Mary had a traditional funeral meaning that she lay in state at home for three days, beautifully dressed by Sven and their two daughters. What a gift to family and friends who could then move in and out of her special room, taking whatever time they needed to say goodbye and offfer prayers for her spirit to ascend.

By the third day she was indeed gone from this life, resurrected and in the Divine light. That Sunday (only a week ago?) she was gently transferred to her coffin in the front yard, where family and friends were gathered in a circle, surrounded by sunshine, flowers, birdsong, and butterflies, singing and final goodbyes. An inspiring service was then held at Michael Fields nearby with the focus on aiding her spirit to return Home.

Join me in celebrating the incredible life that was Mary, will you? Rejoice in all she accomplished for such a relatively short life, and the legacy that will continue through her work and music for generations to come.

There will be a Memorial Service at Prairie Hill School where she taught music and the girls now attend, on October 7, her 47th birthday. The two-CD set she completed just two weeks before her death will be introduced, I STILL HAVE JOY, and made available. (More information will be available on her continuing website: naturallyyoucansing.com) I will add a final update after the Memorial service. Namaste, Suzanne

Dear Ones, who join us in this journey with Mary,

Time for an update. Here we are almost a month later, inspired by Mary’s awesome courage and grit, Sven’s unwavering committment to her care, and their daughters’ childhood joy as they live in the NOW surrounded by loving and competant parents and caregivers. What beacons and models they each provide to the rest of us for coping with very challenging circumstances.

Mary’s recent travels to Hawaii and Montana were nurturing and expansive for her, each in their own unique way. She is drawing on those energies this month as she faces increasing challenges. There was a procedure to alleviate pain the end of July that wasn’t very successful. The last two weeks have seen her esophagus close again to the point that she could only get liquids down.

She and Sven decided to go to Mayo again and visit the esophageal department as her treatment there in June was topnotch. The head of the Department, who treated and was charmed by our Mary (big surprise) made things happen in a hurry. An appt at the pain clinic and procedures all scheduled last Friday, August 10, achieved the following: 1) they changed some of her pain meds around to see if they couldn’t get her more comfortable as well as more alert–we’ll now in a few days how effective the new regime is, and 2) a look by camera at the esophagus discovered that the stent put in in June had ‘migrated’ (they didn’t know where and weren’t particularly worried about this for whatever reason) allowing unrestrained cell growth which grew into the esophagus again. They put in a second stent which they hope will be anchored by all that cell growth. Mary was told it would take a few days to reach full expansion.

Mary and Sven were back in their hotel room Friday night and travelled back home Saturday. When I spoke with her this morning, Mary said she was ‘feeling out of it’ with all the new meds, and thinking she would spend some time this afternoon simply sitting in her garden, soaking up all the abundant energy out there.

Our heartfelt thanks for your prayers, emails, and the torrents of love and light you send. What an incredible tribute it is to how many lives and hearts Mary has touched, and will continue to touch during this journey and beyond.

My love, gratitude, and blessings to all of you who are reading these words and accompanying us on this path, wherever it takes us.

Mom/Suzanne

Hello to All,

What a month it has been for Mary, nearly all of it good. Visiting Hawaii with its strong spiritual energies for two weeks in June was restorative and transformative. She had a spectacular experience at the mouth of one of the volcanoes, invoking Pele, the goddess of fire and health, petitioning her healing powers. I hope Mary will put that into her own words one of these days on this site as it is most inspiring.

After a week at home unpacking and packing, she and her family traveled by train to Whitefish.MT for a large family gathering for a week. This was historic as our gatherings are relatively rare. Mary joined in wholeheartedly, taking long hikes up mountain trails and a helicopter ride overlooking Gladier Mountain Natl Park. Those with her on one of the hikes told of feeling like they were in the movie SOUND OF MUSIC as Mary sang all those glorious songs high in the mountains! Can’t you just hear her?

So along with the energies of Hawaii and the ocean, she received mountain energy within a month’s time. Talk about’ living out loud’, from a plaque in her cabin!

Within a few days at home, she recovered from the rigors of two big journeys and is now focusing on recording and releasing her new CD aptly named’ I STILL HAVE JOY, Medicine Songs and Chants For Health, Peace and Well Being’ Heer tentative schedule is to record the second week in August, with mid-October slated for a CD release party. Please go to her website, NATURALLYYOUCANSING.COM for info and updates.

Mary is also formulating plans for a singing school, which she is naming the Tourmaline School after a crystal of the same name with very special properties. The singing school is to open June, 2008 in East Troy where she lives.

She continues with all her complimentary therapies, focusing on building her physical strenth and endurance. This includes arobic exercise to tolerance, mainly climbing steps three times a day, to increase oxygen intake to therapeutic levels as cancer cells die when exposed to oxygen. ( Isn’t that a nugget , though!) Yoga and meditation are also part of her daily practice, rising at 5 AM for this personal and prayer time before her children wake. Talk about strong will and spirit, discipline and determination–she definitely qualifies to be ‘the lomilomi Queen!’

Mom/Suzanne