On August 15 we were shocked to learn that my oldest sister, Lulie*, was lying unresponsive in a hospital in Chattanooga, Tennessee, near where she lived. She passed away Tuesday morning, August 21, just hours after the father of her children, Bud*, went into the presence of the Lord in a hospital in Oakland, Maryland. I’ve been sorting through my memories ever since the phone call, traveling to Tennessee and spending time at the hospital with other members of our family.

The process reminds me of a jeweler sorting through precious stones, turning them in various directions to see what they look like when they catch the light. Some of my memories sparkle and bring me joy, while others are dark and bring me to tears. Some I can share while others are too personal to bring into public view.

Lucy was almost exactly nine years older than I am, both of us born in June. I’m sure I caused her endless frustration as little sisters do, but I know she loved me and her two other younger sisters dearly. It couldn’t have been easy for her to share a bedroom with the “girlies,” because of the age difference. She and I shared one double bed, while Judy and Ruthie shared another.

My memories of those days include Lulie reading to us after the four of us were in bed. She read books we loved like Nancy and Plum, which was filled with Nancy said, Plum said, Nancy said, Plum said, which must have been a trial to her writer’s sensibilities, and Prairie School, which was literally falling apart from the many times it had been read.

Before we went to sleep, I also remember her writing in her diary with her favorite fountain pen, Druscilla, which often left green ink stains on her middle finger. She would tuck her diary under the mattress to hide it, perhaps from our big brother Ron? Certainly her little sisters knew where it was. I don’t remember ever reading it, but I’d be amazed if we didn’t!

Lulie was twelve and a half when we had a little sister who died at birth. Our mom was very ill afterward, physically and emotionally. I believe other older cousins came to help, but Lulie carried a lot of responsibility on her thin shoulders. (I have clear memories of her braiding my hair in French braids so tight my eyes nearly popped because those braids lasted longer.) Her patience was often thin but looking back, I can understand why—herself to get ready, hair to braid, lunches to pack, homework to keep up with, and housework to do.

When she began dating Bud, I saw him as a bit of competition for my big sister’s attention. I was seven and she was sixteen. My other sisters and I used to spy on them from upstairs, and once we put a big, blue stuffed monkey in the living room with a bowl of popcorn  for them when they came home from a date. (We had named the monkey Treat-a-Popcorn for some unknown reason!)

If Lulie and Bud weren’t getting along or if she was having a disagreement with Daddy, we could count on wild, tumultuous piano playing and door slamming as she vented her emotions. Bud and Lulie married in 1960 and took the vacant bedroom my brother, Ron, had left when he  married in 1959. Later, they moved to a house on the Bender farm. I missed her terribly and one of my favorite things was to visit them.

Lulie made the best spaghetti and meatballs, chocolate chip cookies, and banana cake, and we loved to watch The Three Stooges and I Love Lucy on their television. We didn’t have a television at our house. In 1961, Lulie gave birth to Steve, the first of three boys. They all became the apple of my eye. I loved going to stay with them for a week to help my sister who soon had her hands full with three boys in a little over three years. They were adventurous, to say the least, and the fact that they all lived to adulthood was truly miraculous.

I graduated from high school in 1969 and moved to Indiana. That same year, Lulie published a book, The Outside World, that, in many ways, was autobiographical. She had been writing and publishing in Mennonite Sunday School papers for some time, but this was her first book. She and Bud had left the farm and moved to Morgantown, West Virginia, the year before.

Little did we know the heartbreak that was to come the following year as Bud and Lulie’s marriage broke up a month or so before Donn and I were to be married. Bud and Lulie were both to be in our wedding. The memories of the days and years that followed contained some of those dark stone memories that could still bring me to tears almost fifty years later.

And yet because of the parallel paths their lives followed in the last months that they lived, it’s impossible not to believe that in some way, Lulie and Bud were still connected. As we reconnected with their precious boys and some of their families over the past week, reminiscing, laughing, crying, praying and singing, a lot of the sting has been removed from those dark stone memories for me, and I hope for others who were there. For those who couldn’t be there, I pray that healing will come as we walk through the days ahead, holding our memories in the light and asking for healing from the One who has already made Bud and Lulie completely whole.

*Lucy and Mark were their given names, but we never called them anything but Lulie and Bud for reasons unknown to me.

Photos: 1) Lucy Bender, photo taken for her book; 2) Internet; 3) l to r Lucy, Mom holding me, Ruthie, Judy; 4) the “girlies” Judy, Ruthie, Daisy; 5) Lucy’s book; 6) Larry, Nick, and Steve; 7) Mike; 8) Donn (and me) graduating from Goshen College about a month before our wedding; 9) 1^st row l. to r. Mike Bender, Janice Bender (Steve’s wife), Ruth, 2^nd row Jeff Bender, (Mike’s son), Steve Bender, Daisy & Donn, 3^rd row: Nick Bender, Harold Yoder (Ruth’s husband), Larry & Natalie Beiler 10) Lucy wearing a kimono Daddy brought for her from Japan.