In Memorium – A Gathering of Friends in Memory of Squinternet Larnia

I appreciate everyone’s kind offerings of help and the many people who reached out to help make a meaningful tribute to our lost friend, Squinternet Larnia. After many notecards, IMs, and personal conversations, I’ve followed my heart and many of your suggestions to a simple but elegant solution that I hope meets everyone’s needs and wants.

Saiyge Lotus gracious stepped up to offer to build us a beautiful memorial garden on the ground level at the homestead sim where the Donna Flora main store is currently located. She is in the process of building at this time.  She has also created a beautiful memorial tree, which will be available for everyone to take, in memory as a keepsake. We thank her for her generous donation of time, effort and love for this.

The garden will be open this weekend, for anyone who wishes to visit – go to the Donna Flora main store location and take the teleport to the ground level. At 9 AM SLT on Saturday, September 14th we will be holding a secular gathering of friends. All are welcome to come and share their memories of Squinternet with us.

Anyone who would also like to use this space for their own memorial, in Italian,  for a Mass, or whatever you would like, is welcome to do so through the month of September. We should all use the place to celebrate Squinternet’s time with us and remember her with love and respect.

The garden will be open for the rest of the month of September for anyone to visit and remember Squint.

Thank you so much, for all of your ideas and contributions. I appreciate all of you very much, as would Squinternet.

 

May eternal light shine upon her,

Gidge

A Time To Gather

When LOVE DONNA FLORA was conceived of by Cajsa, it was a two fold purpose. One part, to raise funds to help offset the enormous healthcare costs Squinternet was incurring, and the other part was to give her a gift that many of us never get – the opportunity to see what it is we do mean to other people. So often, people shower praise and love after a person dies, and we have to wonder – did they KNOW?

Squinternet knew. She read your posts on the days she was able to sit up and use her computer. She was strong enough one day to tour the event. She was amazed. It made the nights of pain and worry tolerable – because you filled her with joy and hope.  It was lead by Cajsa but it was created by all of you, this great swell of love and outpouring of support for one of our own.

When the news came yesterday, Cajsa immediately became swamped with questions about doing a memorial. and it quickly became clear that Cajsa needs to be allowed to grieve. She’s worked so very hard on all of this, to the detriment of her own health on some days, that I told her I would step in and handle putting something together.

That’s where you come in .

None of us own Squinternet’s memory or our love for her. I’ve solicited ideas for what people would like to do, in memory of Squinternet on plurk and have already received many good ideas. Not all of them will be do-able but they help guide me to something that will help us mourn together, and grieve together in a way best suited to us all.

At this time, I asking all of you to please either plurk me, or IM me in world, or just leave in comments here, what you would like to see us do to memorialize Squinternet.  What I will be planning will be something secular to celebrate and reflect upon her time with us, and our love for her.

I realize some people might feel a strong need to include a religious memorial. If someone wants to add that in to the plans I end up making – that’s just fine with me, it’s outside my sphere of influence however.  If you would like to hold your own celebration and memorial, or 100 of them, that’s fine too.

There is no wrong way to remember our friend Giulia.

This is how I’m proceeding. I value all of your input and ideas. We’ll plan a memorial event soon – so please let me know what your thoughts are, I am very interested.

❤ Gidge

 

 

 

The Place To Shop: Donna Flora

 I grew up in a small town, complete with a huge courthouse square around which all of the town’s activity took place. If you didn’t drive to the city to buy clothes, and you were from a “nice” family, you shopped at Newkirk’s.
Newkirk’s had a men’s section, a children’s section and a ladies section, each was it’s own store with it’s own entrance but were joined by very discreet doorways in between.  The front of the ladies section was labeled Club Wear. That means country club, not da club. Slacks, polos, cardigans, cricket skirts and sensible but fashionable shoes. The center was intimates, “foundation garments” and sleepwear. But the back, the back was what I thought was magical.

Soft, plush chairs for those waiting, tri-fold, fingerprint free mirrors and crystal chandeliers adorned the evening wear section. I had to sit quietly, while my mother tried on item after item. The sales lady would bring her boxes of jewelry to try on with the dresses. They sold hose and gloves – in boxes, not little plastic bags. It was elegance, and it was grace, in a small shop in central Indiana.

The first time I walked into Donna Flora in SL, I felt that same spirit. A sense of style and class, that it was hard to define yet I knew it when I saw it. The shop has always been a staple food in my diet of SL consumerism. But more than that, people who know me, always have known I love Donna Flora.

Not like some unattainable beauty – but that, this is where I shop. My husband hasn’t been in SL in probably two years, but when he was here and we were buying me new jewelry, he knew to take me to Donna Flora.

If I were only allowed to ever shop in one place in Second Life, it would be hard NOT to choose Donna Flora.

Thank you for bringing grace, and elegance to our Second Lives Squinternet. We owe you a debt of gratitude for all this beauty that we will be hard pressed to ever repay you.