Val was a beautiful human being- kind, thoughtful, generous, upbeat, and oh so caring. When we first started working in the same office together at CDPH almost 10 years ago, we knew each other a little through our mutual friend, Nancy Guenther. It wasn’t long after she started working in the office, I had cancer surgery and had to take off a month from work. To help me out, she started a sign-up sheet for co-workers in the office to drop off food for me at my home. I will never forget what a selfless act that was. While our work took us to different programs within the department not long after that, we would meet for lunch on occasion and talk about our issues, what was going on politically, and have some laughs. She loved talking about Virgil and Evan. We managed to extend our 1-hour lunches to at least 1 ½ hours, as there was much to discuss! On one occasion, she gave me a book by Rick Steves, because she knew how passionate I was about traveling. The periods in between our lunches, I would receive detailed, lengthy and newsy emails about her life, which I always looked forward to reading. And I always looked forward to getting the holiday picture every year of her, Virgil and Evan. Oh, how I will miss her and her beautiful smile. RIP Val. And rest assured I will continue the cancer fight for you.❤️