After an unexpected and brief fight with colon cancer, Shirley MacMillan Rarig died peacefully June 24th, 2009, exactly 2 months after the death of her husband of 60 years, Sam Rarig.

Novelist Yann Martel wrote, "To lose your father is to lose the one whose guidance and help you seek, who supports you like a tree trunk supports its branches. To lose your mother, well, that is like losing the sun above you." Such are the feelings of Sam & Shirley's five adult children, as they share the following thoughts about their warm, day-brightening, dependable mother: