No Plain Jane--RIP Jane Lyons Boffeli

The Denver sister called with sad, but not unanticipated news yesterday: Jane Lyons Boffeli succumbed to the cancer she battled so fierce and spiritedly the past years. One marveled at it, especially when we visited her in May, found her fashion model thin, voluble as ever. 
(Love those two--the Denver sister and hubby ever appropriate: when I faltered before challenge of what to give a dying woman; they came with the quintessential one: Colorado weed!)
Jane had been through rounds of chemo and a couple remissions by then, and we wondered how, where she got the force and fierce, since sis and I both know neither own that.  
Jane & Dave lived in a geodesic dome-abode in the woods that felt like a tepee with electricity and indoor plumbing. She had filled it with Indian memorabilia, which intrigued me, as her personal style had a sparcity that is the antithesis of my ornate Victorian one. 
I recall a sunny day in summer 2013, when Jane and I sat on her deck among the trees and flowers, drank beer, her favorite libation, and I presented her with another just-right gift the Denver sister hadn't time to bring: a wind chime. Jane enthusiastically loved it (I take half the presents I get back) and installed it just behind us, where it tinkled like a bright blithe spirit throughout our visit that day and was still tinkling in its place in May.
That afternoon I discovered in Jane Boffeli someone so rare I could barely count on the fingers of one hand individuals the like of her: Someone who understood me instinctively, to whom NEVER need apologize or even explain what I thought or said or did, and I reveled in it. A couple hours in her presence left me a blithe spirit--right and light almost birdy--so very rare for a laden, leaden soul, often fired, indicted and dismissed by the rest of the world. 
That afternoon, then I suddenly noted the shadows had grown long, and Jane sat exhausted, barely able to say goodbye. I jumped up and ran off, chastising myself for remaining  too long, dissipating and usurping the force she needed for her own battle, vowing never to return.

Any critical eye realizes grief is half regret--I-should-have. . . I-shouldn't-haves, and this morning I am grieving a woman I knew so well and so little.