My friend Dannah (Russell) Jones died this past Friday morning, after collapsing following exercise the night before. She was thirty-eight years old.
I met Dannah when we were freshmen at Georgetown College in 1997. She was a self-proclaimed “military brat” lately of Dayton, Ohio. She had a spark of life, humor, and intelligence. She made some friends, but she wasn’t a “joiner.” If Dannah didn’t like you, you’d know about it.
That entire freshmen year, Dannah and her roommate Crystal hung out often with me and my roommate Charlie. We’d knock around the greater Lexington, KY area in her Hyundai Accent 2-door hatchback, Charlie and I smashed into the back seat. The first (and only) time I ever saw Titanic we went in her car.
As people do, we parted ways. I decided to bury my heart in work, where it would stay for the next 15 years and Dannah apparently went to to a career at NASA and other concerns in Alabama.
She loved her family like she loved everything: Fiercely, and beyond reason. Dannah was the kind of individual who’d stand in front of a bullet for anyone….anything…she loved.
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I’ll close with one small anecdote:
One night driving on US-25 from Georgetown, Dannah and Crystal happened upon a cat hit by a car. Most folks would’ve driven straight by, but they stopped.
The cat was mortally wounded and wouldn’t last long.
Dannah wasn’t okay with that. No sir.
She scooped up the cat and put its broken body into her high school letterman jacket that she wore often. She then threw Crystal the keys and said, “Get us to an animal hospital.”
They went to the Vet office on 25 in Georgetown. It was like 11pm, so no one was there and there wasn’t an oncall number or anything like that. So, they did a hazard-flashers-blazing banzai run as fast as that Accent would go down to Lexington. Along the way they got pulled over.
“Can I see your license, ma’am?” posed the officer, flashlight in hand at the door.
“LOOK,” bellowed Dannah, “I have a DYING CAT HERE, and I NEED TO GET IT TO A DOCTOR, OKAY?!”
Per my understanding, by sheer force of will, Dannah got that cat a police escort to the 24-hour vet clinic, where despite heroic measures it died.
That was Dannah. Anyone that knew her probably has ten stories just like that.
Goodbye, Dannah, until we meet again. God bless your family; I can’t imagine the hole in their lives now.