A friend has died

and  I am, for a moment, looking back on fifty plus years. 
We met over the Girl Guides.
That particular Guide Company met at school in the lunch break. Yes, it sounds odd but it was an Extension group - a group for girls with disabilities. I was a "Cadet" at the time -  in training to be a Guide leader.  It was part of my teacher training. I had to do something like that. I wasn't permitted to use my time in the residential nursery school for the deaf so I went off to the school instead. (It's all a long story. I won't repeat it here.)
And it was there I met J..... She was the oldest member of the group - not much younger than me. Even then she was the "sensible" and "reliable" one. She could haul the others into line - and they listened to her. 
We understood one another well from the start. We shared experiences.  "You do it like that?" and "Have you tried it like this?" and "What if we start this way?" all became part of the weekly meeting.  
"Captain" was one of the staff of course but she welcomed my presence and often left me entirely alone because there were so many other demands on her time. That was fine by me. We worked through what the girls - all seven of them - could do. I sought help from my own Cadet leader. One lunch time she took time off work and came and "tested" some of them for what they could do. What a day that was for J....  an award at last. What is more it was awarded on an equal basis with everyone else with the exception of the one thing she found physically impossible. We had, with negotiation, found a substitute.
When I had to cease helping  I was sorry. It had been a challenge and great fun. I knew what I would miss most was the challenge of all of us finding our way around the things we found difficult. J... was always there in the thick of it with her positive, "What if we try it this way?"
    "Don't lose touch,"J.... told me. I knew it wouldn't be easy. It wasn't as if either of us could simply get in a car and go to see the other. But J... was the one to write the first letter.  It was short. Writing was difficult for her. I was typing mine and that was easier.
Over the years we corresponded spasmodically.  Then the school reunions started. The woman who had been the headmistress realised the importance of those  reunions. She sent me an invitation as well. On it was a note, "Cat, please come. You are part of our community."
I don't much care for reunions but I went. J... was there of course. Good to see her? Yes. It was good to see the others as well. We just picked up where we had left off.
It went on like that over the years. We would see one another at the annual reunions. We wrote in between - not often but enough to keep up contact. 
I was abroad when she lost her brother in an horrific accident. All I could do was write to her.
I was abroad when she married too. For a few years she lived in army accommodation. Find it tough? No. She went out of her way to organise a group for the women who were finding it tough. 
The internet came along and, with it, email. It meant we could make contact more easily.  That was just as well because eventually the reunions stopped. The former headmistress was over 90 when she organised the last one. She went into a nursing home. The school's purpose changed and there was nowhere to meet. 
J....and I maintained our contact but she was living more than two hundred kilometres away.
She is being buried in the same cemetery as her parents and her brother.  It's in a small community in the north of the state. I know that's what she wanted. 
So this is goodbye J... Thank you for your friendship - and all you taught me.