Just My Opinion - By Mary Kilen
There’s Just A Void
We were just working away on Friday afternoon, plugging along, when the phone rang and everything kind of stopped. April Fleming was calling to let us know that Carol Ann Jones had passed away.
It’s hard for me because Carol Ann has been a friend for so long and part of our newspaper since the early 2000s.
Carol Ann started out doing some profile pieces, covering some of her favorite stories to share with readers. My God, that woman had a way with words and a way to share a story that painted a full picture. One of her favorites was doing a story on the Paul Broste Rock Museum in Parshall. She loved that place and just couldn’t wait to share it with readers.
In September of 2003, she started writing her weekly column “Riding The Prairie Winds”. I can’t remember why she started writing, but I can tell you it was always entertaining. She loved to tell the stories of growing up on a farm near Palermo. One of those, her first I found published, is in her column space this week. She would tell stories of the people who grew up in the area and stories of her travels on her Harley. There were so many stories that would eventually become her book.
Like many of us who write columns, she would also share stories of her family. She loved her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She loved the time she spent with them and would often let us see a little window into those relationships in her column. I may not have ever met them, but over the years I felt like I had gotten to know them pretty well.
I have my own special memories of Carol Ann. When Don passed away in March of 2003, she was one of the first to encourage me to continue on my path with the newspaper. She was always there to support me on my journey and knew just the right words to say when I was struggling. She was also a huge supporter of many in the community. I don’t think people really knew how giving she was and how much her heart hurt when someone else was hurting.
Mondays at the office were often filled with texts between us. It would usually start with either me asking if she was still working on her column or her telling me she had just sent it and asking if I had found it.
That might be followed by random chitchat about what was going on in town, news of someone’s passing, how work was going, or just about anything else.
The past couple months, those texts have sometimes included conversations about her health and whether or not she had unfortunately landed in the hospital again. Carol Ann was a cancer survivor. Unfortunately those treatments years ago had left her with some long-term health issues including lymphedema in her legs.
It just doesn’t seem right to be sitting here on Monday, writing my column, without checking in with Carol Ann.
I’m sure her column this week would have been almost giddy as she watched the start of the inauguration of Donald Trump. Chances are she would have waited as late as possible to finish to get in as many details as possible. I am positive that she enjoyed watching it all from her new vantage point on high.
The void we are feeling here at the office will also be felt on the pages of this paper in the weeks to come as there will be no more columns from my friend. I haven’t figured out what I’ll do with that space yet and I’m going to take my time thinking about that..
As I’m writing, I still don’t have any details of services yet, so I can’t share that with our readers.
Instead, I’ll end this with rest in peace my friend. I don’t know if it is possible, but I sure hope you have a Harley to ride and somebody has your space decorated in pink!