tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6058130272770450817.post-71570916581019705872008-03-08T04:07:00.000-08:002008-03-08T04:59:03.414-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp2.blogger.com/_rgrNzG6dzMg/R9KDExprsNI/AAAAAAAAACs/3zvr__oNxDU/s1600-h/Saffron+rice+close-up.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://bp2.blogger.com/_rgrNzG6dzMg/R9KDExprsNI/AAAAAAAAACs/3zvr__oNxDU/s400/Saffron+rice+close-up.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5175343039873003730" border="0" /></a><br />On August 16, 2004, my sister Julia Ann Thompson was killed in a car crash, at 61.<br /><br />On August 30, 2004, 6 p. m. friends and family held a memorial service of overflow proportions at the First Unitarian Church, Alton, Illinois, and there was a later service in Pittsburgh.<br /><br />Julia's 65th birthday is March 13th, 2008.<br /><br />Julia has been lightly resting in a family linen closet during the intervening years, something like three and a halfish years.<br /><br />Today, we bury her ashes on the land where she grew up. Her remains will rest in place...on the place where she rode horses, walked, laughed, loved, cried, wrote poetry and physics formulas... she will rest, most beloved, and yes, in great natural peace.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://bp1.blogger.com/_rgrNzG6dzMg/R9KJohprsOI/AAAAAAAAAC0/MHEYSv8bAmE/s1600-h/IMG_0898.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://bp1.blogger.com/_rgrNzG6dzMg/R9KJohprsOI/AAAAAAAAAC0/MHEYSv8bAmE/s200/IMG_0898.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5175350251123093730" border="0" /></a>Julia was a worldclass physicist who taught at the University of Pittsburgh and was known as a great innovator there. She had been principal investigator on experiments at BNL, CERN, Fermilab, and Novosibirsk. She also founded Research Experience for Undergraduates—Focus on Minorities--to encourage minorities’ participation in science. The Julia A. Thompson Memorial Fund, Associated Bank, 104 Homer Adams Parkway, Alton, IL 62002, supports increased participation of minorities in the sciences.<br /><br />Evergreen Heights, our ancestral land, founded by my renowned horticulturalist greatgrandfather Riehl in the 1860s, nurtured all three of my father's children: Julia, Gary, and myself (Janet). I rejoice in the feeling of the land now embracing my sister's ashes and nurturing her as she goes where we cannot.<br /><br />Rest in Natural Great Peace, my dearest heart.<br />Rest and reach into the great beyond.<br />Reach, and find, and rest again.<br />Rest again, and again, and again in Natural Great Peace<br />my dearest heart<br />and find solace in all these places of land and of sky<br />find solace in the places which cannot be named or known before time.Janet Grace Riehlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03921731725804450430noreply@blogger.com