The French town we live in is very small. There's just a bakery and a gas station, which has been there for many years.
When her husband died shortly after we moved to town, Mme Pouquerou became the sole proprietor. Barely 4 feet tall and bent over with age, she somehow managed to always get up and attend to folks personally when they'd come to the pumps. When I would arrive, I would roll my bike down the slight hill from my house to the gas station and chat with Madame while she put gas in my bike. At first I wanted to do it myself, but I realized after a while that although she wasn't much taller than the top of my tank, she never spilled a drop. She always made a small, rather dry joke before I left just to share a laugh, and she never treated me like the stranger in town that I am. I had heard that there is to be a new gas station built along the main road on the outskirts of the town later this year,( the bakery is also moving out there) and that Mme. Pouquerou was going to close the station, as she had no direct relatives or children. I stopped to see her last Sunday, and was a bit relieved and surprised that she didn't try to get up from her desk to serve me gas. I asked her if it was OK to pump it myself, and when I was finished, I chatted with her and ended up laughing with her as I left. I just received word that she passed away at her desk on Thursday. I don't like funerals and usually avoid them, but I'm sorry I missed the little mass they had today. RIP
