It is hard to think of Lynn Palmer as a memory. The shock of her sudden and unexpected death is just beginning to abate as the reality of her absence among us slowly sinks in. Lynn is still very much a part of the people, places and animals that she loved: her family, her church family, her friends, her patients, her colleagues, her farm, her towns (Vidalia and Natchez), her country, her beloved horses, dogs and, yes, her goats!

Lynn was my friend in several of these contexts, but for the most part our connection was through her love of The Natchez Children’s Home and New Covenant Presbyterian Church. She supported the Home in so many ways; hosting fundraisers, sponsoring children, seeking programs which would help meet their needs, and using her wonderful healing skills to treat their illnesses.

As a Trustee of New Covenant she has been intimately involved in almost every program of the church since its beginning. Serving on the building committee she helped plan the almost completed new church buildings on Homochitto Street. She was a musician who frequently played for services. She led the congregational singing and sang with the ensemble; she often cooked for Wednesday evening suppers, took her turn in the nursery, and met every week with the brown-bag ladies’ noon prayer group at the church. She accompanied a group sponsored by New Covenant on numerous trips to Peru to Christian orphanages there, bringing medical help, medicines and love to the children.

And all of this, in fact her entire life, was centered around her faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior — a faith which she readily shared when the opportunity presented itself, and which she daily demonstrated in the way she lived.

For myself, I have no doubt where Lynn is now. But how I will miss pulling up behind her car and reading that great sticker on the bumper which reads:

“A woman’s place is on her horse.”

Kathie Blankenstein is a Natchez resident.