I’m not sure who took this photo of Donna Nicosia, Susan Popper and Deb Glessner at one of the Bedlam Farm Open Houses five or six years ago. It says a great deal. Susan had quite a smile.

It might have been me holding one of their cameras, or I might have grabbed this shot myself, I love the image of joy and friendship, our pasture is in the background. Susan so loved our farm.

Donna and Deb were two of Susan’s closest friends, she told me often how much she admired and trusted them.  She made several pilgrimages to visit them, and traveling was not easy for her. Love just flowed between them.

Susan had great trouble making and nurturing friendships, as do I.

But she loved these two, and they gave her much love back. Donna, she told me, became the closest friend she had ever had.

Tuesday, Donna came up from New Jersey in a nasty winter storm to say goodbye to Susan, whose blood pressure continues to drop and whose breathing continues to slow. She is in a deep sleep, peaceful and soft. No pain, no suffering. I am not a doctor, but I believe it will not be long now.

Susan opened her eyes when she heard Donna speak – Donna is not easy to ignore – and we both saw a thin smile.  She went right back into her deep sleep.

She is no longer speaking. Every day, she goes deeper into the other world.

Donna often came up to our Open Houses to be with Susan, and I only got to talk to her briefly. Susan named both of us as Patient Advocates, along with her brother. And Donna and I have been talking every day, usually more than once.

I believe I can say we have become good friends, words I rarely speak.

Donna has, like Susan, been through a lot, and she handles it with grace and love.

She isn’t rich by any means, and she is caring for her very sick mother. It is difficult for her to get up here to see Susan, but she has done it twice. And I know she has little money to spare.

I’ve tried to help pay some of her costs, but she will only accept money from me for care for Susan’s dog Sally. (You can help by donation for Sally’s veterinary care and travel costs to get to her new home in Oregon: e-mail [email protected].)

Today, Donna and I sat with Susan, talked with the nurses, rubbed Susan’s arm, held her hand. We tried playing the Grateful Dead (no response) and I took Donna out to lunch. she looked tired and hungry.

We went to the hospital cafeteria.

We laughed a bit and cried a bit. Saying goodbye to Susan was not easy for Donna.

Donna sat with Susan for much of the day – I was there for three hours – and she just conked out around 9 tonight. She’ll see Susan in the morning and head back to New Jersey.

I very much enjoy talking to Donna, a working-class Jersey Girl who has never totally left the 60’s behind, but who accepts life and rejects drama. It is healing and helpful for me.

We talked for a long time about why it was that Susan was able to trust her so much and open up to her so completely. Susan told me Donna was the only person she trusted to tell about her sickness, and even then, I learned, Susan didn’t tell her how bad things had gotten.

Susan had so much trouble asking for help.

When there was trouble, she acknowledged, she just went inward and curled up.

I also talked about my own struggles to be friends with Susan, and how ironic it was that we broke through to one another only when she was gravely ill. We never got as close to each other as she and Donna did.

We were never completely at ease with one another.

I suppose that it isn’t surprising that we connected, though, in such circumstances we take the masks off.

She told me she thought we were much alike in so many ways, and this surprised me. She said at the core, it was no easier for me to make friends than it was for her.

But we never were completely easy with one another.

I think she never really got past the celebrity thing, she just thought I was a big deal. I guess I never really figured out how to get close to Susan. Donna does not take no for an answer.

We were both walled off from people sometimes. She said she noticed that Maria had broken down a lot of the walls. This was perceptive and certainly true.

Donna and I talked about Susan’s good nature and loving spirit. We talked about the almost Biblical sadness of her falling so ill so soon after she came upstate to build a new life for itself.

It was brave and inspiring for her to do that.

I asked Susan what exactly spurred this change,  this upending of her life, and she said it was when she came to one of our Open Houses. She loved the farm, the donkeys, the dogs, the people who came, and the life that Maria and I were building she said.

And she met Donna and Deb, two precious friends.

One of the most difficult parts of this for me is to try to come to terms with the way she was struck down so brutally, and her life simply unraveled.

Her brother and I agree that there was a part of Susan that was desperate to live, and a part of her that had given up on life, even before her liver failure and cancer.

So another day on the death watch, this one seemed beautiful to me in some ways. Susan was so peaceful, Donna and I had fun talking with one of the nurses, and also came to appreciate our deepening connection to one another.

I will do my part to continue this new friendship and keep it alive, in Susan’s memory and our own benefit. I think Susan is close to leaving the world.

The nurses said they would call me if there was any change, and I told them I would like to be there if I can when she dies.

I am not her best friend, but I just don’t want Susan to be alone anymore.