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Firs I just want everyone to know that I loved Darlene so much.  She was like a sister to me and will be missed terribly.  What happened to her the knee surgeries, losing her leg and the life she had after that should have been so much more.  John and I wish we could have done more.

Darlene is single-handedly responsible for saving my shoulder from surgery.  I was in a terrible bicycle accident in the early 90's and was thrown forward crashing my right shoulder into a boulder.  After that, I could not move my any of my right arm for a very long time and of course I am right handed making it worse.  I was going to have to have surgery to get back some use.

I had already been a long-time client of Darlene's Theraputic Hands and her massages were absolutely wonderful - so very under-priced for the quality.  And I knew she had been taking classes in medical massage, so she and I determined I had nothing to lose if she tried that technique on me.  I was thrilled because it might mean I might not have to have surgery to bring my right arm back.  

Darlene worked over 6 months on my arm - every week using her special medical massage techniques and slowly I regained full use of it.  I have absolutely no issues with that arm/shoulder today because she was so gifted.  Her hands really were theraputic and I am not sure many outside her clients knew that.  She will be forever my hero for saving me from a lifetime of issues.

So I wanted to tell you a funny story about Darlene when she and I drove to Boston once summer so she could see a pen pal of hers that was in a prison near the outer beltway.  The timing could not have been worse - I was having a difficult time financially and had almost no credit left on my cards and we needed a hotel.  So i think we ended up in the Econo-lodge on the outer beltway of Boston using the last few dollars of credit of multiple cards and Darlene had some cash we used for gas & food.  We did take a commuter train into downtown Boston one day which was pretty cheap and walked around downtown being the typical tourists because we couldn’t afford a tour bus, sharing a bowl of clam chowder and we using our last bit of credit to scrape up enough money to go whate watching.  We did not see any whales and were really disappointed because we should not have spent the money.  That expense meant we had to take the train back no matter what as there was no extra money for a cab.

So we are sitting in the food court of the Boston train station and it's almost midnight - I looked up at the train schedule and for some reason we had both misread when the last train was going out to our station on the outer beltway where the car was parked.  What we thought was about half an hour's grace in that schedule was just a couple of minutes.  The train announcement for our particular train came over the intercom and I jumped and screamed - Run!, Run for the train now or we are going to miss it!

I grabbed up our bags and what we had accumulated beyond that and started for the tracks with Darlene trailing far behind me.  This was long before she had troubles with her knees but Darlene was not a runner.  So I was very far ahead of her and made it to the train about the time the conductor was calling all aboard.  I begged the conductor to wait because he could see Darlene was running as fast as she could but she was very far down from where we needed to enter that railcar.  He took pity on us and waited to call all aboard for the last time just as Darlene reached the steps, completely out of breath.

We both climbed up the railcar's steps and sat across the aisle from each other and she's panting, huffing and puffing.  I was very concerned she was going to pass out on me and asked "Are you OK"  

I have never heard Darlene yell before or since, but she yelled at me "Do I look like I am OK?"  

Well she eventually calmed down because we had to make that train or else sleep in the train station in downtown Boston because we did not have cab fare.  And it really would not have been OK to sleep in the train station.  I am just so sorry I had to make her run like that.

Over the years we had so many laughs talking about that Boston trip and when she lost her leg we commiserated about her running for her life that day, how she wished she could run once more.

Darlene was such a fun person to hang out with and for some of you who got to do that, she would always say, “Let's go ditty-bopping around.”  

Well Darlene, I will go ditty-bopping around now without you but it will not be the same.  You will be so missed.

Love you Darlene!

Melissa & John Lanny Duke