When Malia and I first met
I first starting conversing with Malia in 2003 after finding her blog on rv'ing, she was elusive in posting and would go for periods and post nothing but I would occasionally email her and she would always respond. In 2004 a group of people on the Escapees forum started a Graduating Class of 2005 for people who were going to go full timing in their rv's, certainly this was not a new idea as many many before did this but it fit our schedule. I became involved with the group along with some other very key players Garry Summers, Anne Goldman, Kathy Adams and the one who first headed it up Teresa J Breuer. We had decided to hold our Graduation event in the Mecca of Quartzsite Az where all the fulltime rv'ers would flock to in the winter. Well what would this event be without the Queen of rv'ing attending! So I asked Malia if she would come talk to the group and at the time she said I really don't make plans but will consider it. Well fortunately she did consider and committed to speaking to the group about her experiences and sharing her knowledge with us. Fast forward to her arrival at Quartzsite (she hated it because of the dust but endured it because she promised me she would :) ) I met her at the check in shack and one of the members of the group had secured us a place in the desert but it was about 1 or 2 miles back in so I told her to follow me. We were on our way back to the camp when I saw my first roadrunner ever, I was crazily pointing out my window and trying to call her on the cell and she thought I was losing my mind lol. When we got to the camp she asked me what the hell that was all about and I told her a roadrunner, she smiled and said "I have seen hundreds of them!" laughed and then said it was a defining moment for her as it reminded her of when she first started rv'ing and how the simplest of things excited her. She never forgot that and sent me the attached postcard back in August of 2016. She wrote in huge letters on the back of the card 'LOOK TAB! IT'S A ROADRUNNER!!! :) Such a sweet tender loving individual but with a demented side sense of humor that matched us up so well, a forever friendship was cemented that day for life between us and we never lost touch.
I told her before she passed that we would meet in the desert and I knew it would be her visiting whenever I saw a roadrunner, run free you crazy child of the universe! Love you always! Deanna and Tab,