Nani_260
Legacy Name: Nani_260

The bold words above were written by an amazing friend of mine, my best friend. We've been each others' rock for almost fifteen years, though admittedly, over the years, I've needed her far more than she's ever needed me. This person has always risen to the challenge of comforting me, listening to me, offering me stellar advice, being a shoulder to cry on in times of loss, celebrating with me in times of great happiness and is the only one who has ever been capable of conveying a message to me without saying a word. She's undoubtedly the best person I've ever met and I'm not even being biased, if you met her, you'd think so, too. Should you stop, right now, and think of all the qualities you appreciate in your friends - she has all of those qualities and maybe even a few more. My apologies, I'm not trying to out-best your best friend or rub my totally awesome one in your face or anything, but she's just that good. So, thank you, Amber, Albi, Bergers, Crow, Ferret, New York, Peekaboo. You're the most one of a kind person and one of the purest souls I've ever met, and I consider myself so freakin' lucky to have you in my life. Thank you for being a god damn ninja, doing all this work behind my back and transforming Nani into a character that my Nani would have been honored to know was made in her memory.

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Sally Ann Gnagey, born on July 15, 1935, was known by many as Christine; a name she chose on her First Holy Communion when she was just a young girl. To me though, she was always Nani. Nani was given the name of her future husband by a friend and asked to write him during the Korean War between 1950-1953. From the ages of 15-18, Nani frequently wrote to this man, fell in love with him and agreed to date him when he returned home from war. It wasn't long after he was back that they got married and began to make a family together. Nani gave birth to two boys and two girls. While their children were still fairly young they moved into a small brick cottage in the country, up the hill from a farm, which was transformed into a large brick house by the hands of my grandfather. Fast forward a couple decades. Things weren't perfect. This family had a lot of ups and a lot of downs. When it rained, it poured - and that's a crude understatement. But - when the clouds parted - it was something special. All of my happiest childhood memories are in that house or in that big back yard across from the farm, and many of them include my Nani.

My aunt passed away from a lung disease when I was 15 and a liver disease took my mother the same year, exactly six months apart from my aunt. My grandmother became my legal guardian. Though really, she had always been a second mother to me anyway. I'd spend the next six years with my grandparents until I became a mother myself and my Nani became a Great Nani. But only three short years later, on August 1, 2013, Sally Ann Bruno passed away from pancreatic cancer. She had been admitted to the hospital only four days earlier from dehydration and neither she, or her family, had any idea at all that she was even sick. My son didn't get to spend a lot of time with this amazing woman before she left this world so unexpectedly, but I'm comforted knowing how many wonderful women are looking over him.

My grandmother loved gardening, all kinds of flowers and greatly enjoyed the tweets and twitters of birds in her yard. What she loved the most though were German Shepherds. Her family had always had one growing up and she had one as well, while I was growing up. Her pride and joy, Meia, lived an insanely long life for the breed (14 years) and passed away several months before Nani became ill. In the days leading up to her passing, my grandmother kept looking out the window of her room and when I asked her what she was looking at, she simply replied, "What a beautiful German Shepherd."