Shelia Cope taught me so many lessons.
Literally, as my best Sunday School teacher. And also in general by the way she lived and treated me and everyone who knew her as her dearest friend. So many moments related to Sheila Cope are so poignant in my mind and have only become more so as I've experienced more of life.
The way she looked, for example. Most everything about Sis. Cope was long. She had a long face with a long, round mouth that smiled a huge smile for a long time because she was always smiling. She had a long frame and wore long skirts and had long eyelashes that fluttered so often with laughter and long fingers with long fake fingernails that pointed out so many valuable scriptures to my young, learning mind. Not long about Sis. Cope? Her beautiful gray hair, which stuck out short, short all over her long head. Which is where my Dad, after recently calling her as his new Relief Society President, answered the phone to her call and said, "Sheila Cope, ya big pineapple head!"
She also had long patience and a long sense of humor, which is why she drew a picture of a big pineapple on our signature bathroom wall after that. No offense taken, Bishop!
So much to say about Sis. Cope! She was, as I said, the best Sunday School teacher I ever had. She taught me things about Nephi's vision, something I had studied countless times before under the tutelage of other very great teachers, that I had never learned before. She made us think, she made us wonder about the gospel and helped us form our own testimonies where other teachers didn't quite know how to let that happen. She knew the scriptures so well. She loved them, too, loved studying them and loved sharing them with our young spirits. Such a great, great gospel teacher.
She sang in some kind of quartet or otherwise and I went to watch her perform one time. She wore a great long, blond wig for her performance and though I can't remember what was going on, it sticks in my mind as something totally ok for her to do because she was fun loving and not easily embarrassed.
And there's another lesson--her lighthearted love. She was so young at heart! So much loud laughter and clever joking and fun willingness. Such a good friend because she was so full of love!
As you can tell from my use of tenses, Sheila Cope is gone now. But even in her death she taught me some of the most valuable and most poignant lessons.
The phone call, for one. I had never been present when news of a death was first shared. But I remember that Christmas break we were in the basement and my mom got a call from Sis. Griggs and it was so solemnly received that I was very scared at first that something had happened to Sarah. But I had never seen my mom so sad. No time to clean up or toughen up before passing the news onto her children. And of course a tough woman like my mom would be sad about news like that, because Sheila Cope was such a dear friend to my tough ol mom. And there is nothing so sad as a sudden, young death like Sis. Cope's. That was indeed a very sad moment and a very important glimpse for me, though I didn't know how much it would help me later, of the tender emotions always present underneath my brave mom's seemingly impenetrable shell.
I remember picturing Sis. Cope in her driveway, shoveling the snow before she died. Of course she was doing something serviceable like that. Of course.
And then more lessons at the funeral. I've grown to like funerals less and less as I've experienced more and more of them, and looking back on that one now, I can see the same misery all over her family member's faces that I know now. I, awkward and young and inexperienced in death, was too shy to approach them, so while my dad did, I went to look in her casket. You know it was crazy. That wasn't the first dead body I'd seen. But I looked in at her laying there and knew instantly that the body before me was nothing more--just a body! My testimony of the resurrection, of the spirit, of our call to do more after death was fortified in looking at Sis. Cope in that moment. Because something in me absolutely protested at the thought of Sheila Cope actually just laying still for any amount of time. I knew with a surety that she was very busily running about, talking to people, sharing the gospel, teaching the scriptures, serving people! I knew it! I knew her body was just a mortal shell and her spirit was still busy serving Heavenly Father. Such a clear, distinct impression to me. A hard one to share, because death is so devastating. But in my relatively untouched emotional realm then, that was the thought I had at the side of Sis. Cope's coffin.
One more very hard one, one that has become harder as I've recalled it when looking at my mother-in-law and my own mom and my husband and Bro. Cox and myself. A few days after the funeral, the normal gang gathered at the church to play some late night volleyball. Towards the end of the night, a figure appeared in the doorway of the gym and we all stopped playing to talk to the man. It was Bro. Cope. It was his responsibility to close up the building each night, and there he was a few days after his wife's funeral, just doing his job. That was one thing. The other main thing--man it was hard. I was so young! I couldn't even know what was going on! But I looked at that guy leaned up against the door frame, smiling because he was talking to us, but I just saw a gray outline. His whole soul was visibly broken. I saw it--I saw his shattered heart. I saw him be so sad, I saw him not even really being there, just being there. I saw it then and now I can see it so clearly in my own reflection that that image is so hard. But it was a lesson, again, from Sis. Cope. Her marriage was the most important thing in her and her husband's lives. I could tell by looking at that brokenhearted man leaned up against that door frame, only smiling cus his soul was too devastated to not.
I've thought a lot about all of these things, and thought a lot about them when Billy's dad died. I have Sheila Cope to thank for the gospel knowledge that I learned to love at an early age and so many other lessons on grief and love and service that have helped me see things in a different light, especially when there doesn't seem to be a lot of light to work with. Thank you, thank you, Sis. Cope. I will always be grateful for your friendship and lessons.
