Shirls

View from Beacon Rock State Park, Washington across the Columbia River Gorge to Oregon in 2007. Photo Credit: Pete Ward

Shirley Cameron was one of my best friends. We met when she and a mutual friend came to visit Oregon in 2007 and she stayed a couple weeks with me in my tiny downtown apartment.Less than two years later Shirley (or 'Shirls' as I called her) would return the favor of my hospitality when I came to the UK, with plans in my heart and visas to sort out, looking to settle for a few years. I stayed with her for a couple months while I got my feet under me and tried to figure out life in the UK. I'm so thankful for that time with her. We were both in major transitions in our lives, I just having moved 5,000 miles from life as I've always known it, and she just at the end of a 4+year relationship. We shared wisdom, tears, laughter, advice and lots of prayers and made it through both our transitions thoroughly bonded.

Shirls was such a tender-hearted, gentle soul, but she didn't shy from the truth. She had a way of making me feel safe to be myself in a time when I felt conspicuously different in this new place in which I was slowly establishing my life.Whenever we talked about our struggles she was honest with me and made me feel safe enough to be honest with her.

Some of the most treasured times we had were spent sitting in her car or in one of our living rooms talking through life trouble, man trouble or just the dreams we each had for the future. There was often tears and always prayer at the end of it all. Shirls was the friend you could text, or could text you, any time of day or night when life was hard, In May last year I sat in the exam room with her as the doctor confirmed the problem with her leg was cancer, and there were lots of those texts and prayers back and forth in the following months. 

A month or so on, she rang me after a difficult doctor's appointment to tell me they found lumps on her lungs and unless the chemo worked she had maybe a year left to live. I'll never forget that conversation. I was at church for a night worship and prayer vigil and was going to go up with the worship team in a few minutes when she rang to tell me her news. I found some forgotten corridor to pace as we prayed and cried and I did what I could to encourage and comfort her. The helplessness of that moment, and the disbelief that this could really be happening, still echos in me. It probably always will.

Shirls fought with courage, faith and dignity and let me pray for her healing until the very end. I never saw her angry or bitter about facing death. In fact, she never actually told me she was not going to make it, even when she knew. Maybe I was naive, but it caught me by surprise when the last days came and I knew she was dying. Even then I hoped and prayed for a miracle.

Three months ago yesterday Shirley went peacefully in the night with her parents beside her. I treasure every memory and miss her so much I can hardly stand it sometimes. Shirls planted and cultivated love, courage and faith through our friendship that has changed my life forever. I still find it impossible to get my head around the fact that she's not just a phone call, text or train away and how she can just not be here anymore. But I know where she is and, more importantly, Who she is with. She is completely whole, enjoying heaven and hanging out with Jesus. As much as I miss her I can't begrudge her that.