The Spirit of Compassion ~ A Giver of Life

June 1998

Love, with little hands, comes and touches you with a thousand memories, and asks you beautiful, unanswerable questions.

~Carl Sandburg

Because she was my best friend, I knew she was an incredible human being. I knew that she was extremely creative with each handmade card and gift she slipped into my purse. I knew she was an accomplished writer because she wrote and edited for my newsletter (view article). I knew that she was hard-working, passionate, honest, accepting, loving, generous, compassionate, full of laughter, a good listener and a wise teacher.

I knew many things about what Peggy Kusano accomplished but only because I witnessed her many moments of success, never because she felt the need to boast about them. And so, reading the short biographies her family passed out at her funeral service made me swell with pride in the awareness of all the other things I never knew she achieved.

"Ms. Kusano has 25 years of professional experience, in both private sector and government work. She holds Bachelor and Master of Arts degrees in English, with an emphasis in creative writing. A consultant since 1992, she has provided communications for community relations, advertising and marketing, and creative and technical services for a wide range of clients. [Listed here are innumerable high profile, prestigious local, Pacific basin, national, international corporations and several state and federal government agencies] Ms. Kusano is the recipient of three Ad Infinitum awards... [and] also been recognized with Pele awards."

"Peggy was blessed with a talented mind, which was at once creative and widely knowledgeable. It seemed she knew something about everything. her contributions to the world of work were so varied... Her creativity also extended itself into her hands in that she could draw just about anything, play the piano, create jewelry and ceramic ware, and come up with the most intriguing ways of wrapping gifts. Her abilities, however, were exceeded by her greater inner beauty, which was apparent to all, and through which she truly touched the lives of all who knew her."

Tears overwhelmed us all when it was also announced that Peggy had saved the life of a little boy with the donation of her organs. She was a giver of life in so many ways. Peggy was my best friend, sister, mother, guru, and her heart, always my place of safe haven. I feel extremely fortunate to have been befriended, taught and loved by such a person. Not surprisingly, everyone who met her felt the same way.

Peggy Kusano was born on November 01, 1947 to Glen and Sadako Kusano of Hilo, Hawaii. She attended Hilo High School, graduating in 1965. Following that, she studied both at the University of Iowa and the University of Hawaii at Manoa, receiving her bachelor's and master's degrees in English. Recently, she was nearing completion of a second master's degree, this time in counseling psychology from Chaminade University, where she was about to be honored by induction into Psi Chi, the national honor society in psychology.

Most unexpectedly, in the afternoon of November 22, 1999, Peggy was stricken by a massive brain hemorrhage. She passed away on November 24, surrounded by her devoted friends and family in her last days. She was preceded in death by her father and is survived by her mother and an only sister, Pat, her brother-in-law, Cliff, and two nephews, David and Darren.


October 10, 1998

October 1997

November 21, 1999

And a youth said, "Speak to us of Friendship."

And he answered, saying: Your friend is your needs answered. He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving. And he is your board and your fireside. For you come to him with your hunger, and you seek him for peace.

When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the "nay" in your own mind, nor do you with hold the "aye." And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart; For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unclaimed. When you part from your friend, you grieve not; For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.

And let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit. For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and only the unprofitable is caught.

And let your best be for your friend. If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also. For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill? Seek him always with hours to live. For it is his to fill your need, but not your emptiness. And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.

For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.

The Prophet, Kahlil Gibran