Yellow Woodland SunflowerAfter the Sunday morning service in the nursing home chapel, we gathered in a side room to celebrate her life and bear our grief together.

As patients and friends for many years, many of us knew we’d miss this gracious woman with the healing hands and words of wisdom who worked wonders with our bodies and our souls.

The finest tributes to Dr. Joan Regan were all these healthy people walking into the gathering space. The room resounded with gratitude to Joan for the many times her chiropractic skill spared them from back surgery or released them from a life of pain and suffering.

What could be a more fitting tribute to Joan than for us to read the poems she penned over the years – words of faith and hope, words of courage and strength. Some of these we remembered her reciting to us during our appointments with her. Some of these were inscribed in our Christmas cards. All of these reminded us how to bear the light in the darkness, and how to look for the blessing in every lesson.

When a noble, gifted, soul like this leaves, what’s the blessing for those of us left behind? Perhaps to hope anew that we may be as faithful to our journey as she was to hers? Perhaps to accept the light she has passed on to us, and to carry it as brightly and beautifully as she did hers.

Janice M. Puta
Author of Pathways: Tales for the Spiritual Seeker
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