Recently, I had to write an obituary for one of my closest friends, Bette Johnson. I followed the guide from the funeral home and from this newspaper, dutifully including the facts — date and place of her birth, age at her passing (93), names of her parents and those relatives that survive her. I shared some anecdotal information about Bette, including her accomplishments as an artist. But when I was done, and the 585 words sent off to the newspaper, I felt unsatisfied; I had not captured the essence of this remarkable woman.
So I’m trying again. Born Betty Hazel Rasmusson, Bette dropped the “y” and replaced it with an “e” at the end of her first name — a quiet, rebellious act. She crammed a rag into her seatbelt buckle so it appeared to others that she was wearing a seatbelt, but in truth she refused to wear a restraint in her own car, and battled me when she rode in my vehicle, even when the annoying pinging reminded her to buckle up. She stayed up each night until 3 a.m. and slept until noon. She loved the television shows on public broadcasting that played deep into the night.
Bette ate seven egg whites a day, and threw the cooked yolks out the front door for the birds of prey to eat. She was a vegetarian for over 50 years, but cooked beef roasts for her cats and dogs. She bought the most expensive kind of birdseed in 25 pound bags and kept them in her car; they were too heavy for her tiny body to drag into her home. She rescued spiders and insects from inside her house and gently escorted them out the door. When her dog misbehaved, jumping on visitors, she responded by yelling his name and giving him a doggie treat to get him away from the visitor. Canine trainers cringed. All of her cats ate tuna canned for human, not feline, consumption. She fed feral cats, opossums and skunks that lived under her house.
Bette drank one thimble full of Manischewitz wine in sparkling water each evening, until she decided the daily “cocktail” was turning her into a lush. She carried “Hi Pro” (actually non-fat milk) and orange juice with her whenever she went out, due to her history of bouts with low blood sugar. The only restaurant she visited was the drive-through window at Taco Bell, where she ordered a single “sandwich” of refried beans and lettuce on a tortilla, then drove up the hill, parked on the side of the road, and enjoyed her meal.
Bette fixed broken cabinets, loose tiles, plumbing and electrical issues with duct tape. She recorded the sound of her kitchen sink drain “glugging” and her coffee pot percolating and called it her “Kitchen Symphony.” Bette was known for her lovely paintings of flowers and landscapes, but she was equally comfortable experimenting with materials and creating more radical art. She cut out magazine photos of people and animals and created new, crazy creatures from the anatomical pieces. She dripped iridescent inks on papers, folded them, and made what she called “Seepage and Ooze” paintings. She drew amazing, hilarious cartoons.
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Bette loved the place she lived, a small farm in Odell with an awe-inspiring view of the Hood River Valley, the Columbia Gorge hills, and Mount Adams. When her husband was alive, they maintained a small pear orchard. After her husband’s death, other farmers took over care of her orchard, but she fiercely guarded two trees — a grafted apple tree of unknown variety she named “Abigail,” and a plum tree she named “Prunella.” She hung signs on the two trees warning trespassers not to touch them. Each fall, Bette invited me to join her in the harvest of the two little trees. We climbed her rickety old ladder, and thanked the trees for the bounty they shared with us. We made applesauce and pie, and dried Prunella’s sweet plums.
Bette lived a humble life that necessitated a careful accounting of her assets. “Pay Day” was the day her Social Security check arrived. She kept old envelopes of cash in a safety deposit box, and jotted little notes on the envelopes when she needed to borrow cash from one fund to pay a bill. Years earlier, she had saved her family from financial ruin by hiding $5,000 in a vacuum cleaner. She wore clothes from the thrift shop and never paid more than $10 for a pair of shoes.
Bette posted notes and poems all around her home, with many of them reminding her to “Breathe.” The last afternoon I visited her, just hours before her death, we held hands and breathed together. I talked to her, something we had done each evening via telephone for more than 20 years. On that last day, she was unable to answer in words, but squeezed my hand. Today, as I write this, I am thankful to have known such an amazing, feisty, creative woman. Rest in peace, my dear friend.
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