Peanut butter and lettuce sandwiches

The parents of our friends are always a little strange to be around, no? They had sex, and created your friend. You know this. How intimate! You feel a need to impress them so they trust you around their kid, yet you don't show off lest you be used to guilt trip their kids when you leave. "Well e.francis didn't think the math test was all that hard..."

Yet some parents are really special.

I've been struggling with what to call her since the day she got sick. She's not my friend's mom, although she is. She's not my friend, really. Let's call her a family friend. Let's call her Beatrix. She'd have liked that name.

Beatrix was a hippy in a small moderate town. She always made me call her Beatrix - even when I first met her back before my memory kicked in. She lived two blocks away for many years. She took us to fabric stores for hours and hours and hours. She had a sewing room. I saw her placenta once. She was always kind and smiling.

Mid-playtime she used to give us the choice of peanut butter and lettuce or cheese and lettuce sandwiches. I remember the first time I was faced with this question. What and what? But that's how she rolled. I always rolled with peanut butter while my sister and our friend favored cheese.

As an adult I still eat this sandwich (more the cheese version for some reason). I put salt and pepper in the middle of a very thick lettuce layer. Sometimes I use both peanut butter and cheese. Sometimes it's all-out gourmet.

I think of her every time, like tonight when I enjoyed this:

Beatrix died way too young this week. The day I found out I remember checking Google News and expecting a headline. A small part of me still expects a headline. Why isn't WGN covering this? Why not the Tribune? Beatrix has passed away, way too young, and that's just that?

That's just that.