My mother once said to me that there were moments in the past 10 years when she would be walking and she would see a reflection in the glass of a window or along some reflective surface, and she would think to herself "Who is that old woman?” 

As I was pulling the photos for the creation of this video I had the pleasure of seeing the child inside the woman and understood why she might wonder who that old woman was, because the twinkel of the childs eye remained in her thought out her life. She maintained that twinkel in her eye throughout a sometimes difficult life and it continus now in our hrearts.  She was not old in her mind or in her dedication to her husband and sons, nor her church family or the community.  She was alive and active and pushing herself, all the while joking what a lazy woman she was.  I can tell you Norma was anything but lazy, she thought continently of others, and spent as much time in prayer as she did awake.  Another time a few months before she had any idea that there was a looming illness she said to me "I feel as if God is with me always and I am in a constant dialogue, a continual state of prayer to him".

I can almost guarantee if you are reading these words you were included in Norma's prayers.  Norma could not be held down to focusing on her family or church or the sick - no she had to go much farther than that, "I've been around the world!" she would exclaim and follow up with an "in prayerer". Prayers for missionaries and friends, past students, past students families, colleagues, parents of collogues, pets and often times people she never knew.  That made no difference to her.  She would often say to me "Bryce, no man knows the cross that another man carries, so pray for your brothern and great them with kindness".  

As I pulled these pictures I saw that kindness and love in the twinkel of her eyes; in her bright smile, I see a reflection of love and compashion that never grows old.