Today an angel was brought home to God. Today we lay to rest a great friend, a sister, a wonderful nurse, a cousin, a niece, a granddaughter, and a loving daughter. Today I am saying goodbye to my dear friend and my dear roommate.

But today I gained a new view of love and life, and will forever be thankful to Jenny for that gift.

My name is Cat Abraham. I met Jenny one August afternoon on the 9th floor of Kiewit. She lived right across the hall from me on the Freshmen Leadership Floor at Creighton University. I distinctly remember the day she came over to my room with an outreached hand and firmly shook it and said, “Hi am Jenny.” We began talking and found out that we were both nursing majors. An instant bond was made.

The two of us, along with fellow nursing students, spent countless hours in the small kitchen that was across from our rooms. Jenny made it her second home. Everyone knew that she was likely to be in there making Easy Mac and listening to music on her little radio. I enjoyed getting to know her those first few months of college and we became attached. We turned to each other for support that first year of college.

That same year, Jenny joined the sorority Gamma Phi Beta where the two of us become “sisters.” And we did just that; we became sisters. Jenny became a sister to many of the wonderful of Gamma Phis who are here today. When it came to sorority life, Jenny was always the one to turn to for costume ideas for a date party. She was also the one who re-wrote the words for our recruitment songs. She simply loved to be around those dear to her at all times.

Jenny became a symbol of fun and love and we all came to cherish her for that. Her love was also spread to many aspects of Creighton Life. Jenny was everywhere doing everything. She wanted to make a difference. She put 110% into absolutely everything she did. She pulled the best out of all of us. She had this way of convincing us all that we could do better, that we must to better. She motivated everyone and had this fire that we all would be in awe over.

As a nurse, Jenny was even more spectacular. She was the rock of our class. Just this weekend, I was talking to one of our fellow nursing students and we were discussing how we would not have made it through nursing school without her. Having gone through cancer as a child, Jenny knew what it was like to be a patient. Because of that, we learned lessons from her that we could never learn in a classroom. She taught us how to care, how to truly care. All of us would spend hours at Panera Bread talking about school and how we hated it at times, yet we all knew that we had a calling to the profession. Jenny truly did.

Jen also had this hilarious side to her; she had this way of being so unintentionally hilarious. She was known by many as J-Stein. J-Stein would come out at date parties where she knew every single word to Sir Mix-a-Lot’s “Baby Got Back.” She always had on the most creative costumes.

Jenny also loved to cook and throw dinner parties. She would make a feast and we would laugh and talk over a glass of wine late into the night.

She was also on a mission to live, to live life. I will never forget the time when one random day she called me at work on her day off. She said to me, “Um, just letting you know I am in Delaware.”(We were living in DC at this point) I go, “What are you doing Delaware on a Tuesday at 3:00?” She continued on saying, “I am going skydiving!!!” I just smiled to myself and shook my head and said, “Ok, see you for dinner. Enjoy.” She signed up to do everything.

That is how we ended up in DC. We both wanted something different. Jenny was on a mission, a mission to do better. To make a difference. We had both discussed moving and leaving our friend and the comfort of the Midwest to explore a new life in DC, and that was exactly what we did. We did it together. While in DC she made our place feel like an instant home. We made so many friends and another family in DC. Jenny and I loved to go exploring. We would go to museums and to Navy games in Annapolis. She even got into an inaugural ball. Jenny loved her new fun city and being young in that city. She was taking full advantage of all the opportunities.

Jenny wanted the perfect job, a job where she could make an impact. Jenny found that job. She became a pediatric oncology nurse at the National Institute of Health. This was the perfect job for her. Cancer research meets bedside nurse. She would tell me stories when she would come home about the new treatments and pain control that they were using at NIH. She loved it. She loved to learn and absorb everything. She was in love with her job and her kids on that unit.

Jenny went to the Dominican Republic the summer before we moved to DC and learned how to speak Spanish. She had experiences in the Dominican Republic that only she would fully understand. From that experience she learned Spanish and used that knowledge to communicate with her patients.

Then the day came last December when she walked into my room in DC and said, “Something’s wrong. We need to go to the hospital.” Sitting in that ER at her bedside, I was scared. I was scared of what the outcome would be. However, Jenny never showed an ounce of fear. She looked at me and said, “Whatever this is, I will be ok, whatever the outcome is.” That is why I believe right now, as I stand here, that she is ok. She is ok; she is at peace. She went home to St. Louis in January. I took her to Dulles Airport and that was the last time I would see my beloved Jenny. Through those months she was going through treatment, we would talk all the time. She was so strong she never let anyone feel bad for her. She would always ask, “How are you?” I would always laugh to myself because I knew I was fine, she was the one who was sick. That was Jen. She wanted to help everyone else.

She called this summer and said she was able to be a counselor at the cancer camp she was once a camper at. It was so nice because she was giving back to that special place that impacted her so much as a child. I am so happy to hear that so many of you are here today. Her experience there gave her more fuel to fight.

And she did, she fought to the very end. Jenny did everything in her power to make herself heal. She changed her diet completely. She told her mom ‘”I don’t have any control over this cancer, but I have control over what I put in my body.” She took control where she could, and kept a sense of humor during it she told me one time, “I have decided to name my tumor. T-I-M-S. ‘Tumor In My Side.'” She would laugh and call me saying that “TIMS” was acting up. That was Jenny, always trying to make some fun and good out of a bad situation.

Hans Christian Andersen said that “A human life is a story told by God,” and what a wonderful story he shared with us.

Jenny was an angel on earth doing God’s work in every aspect of her life; bringing out the best in her friends and her family and pushing us to do more. Her life was a journey to do better – to make a difference. And it is our duty to continue the legacy and the lessons she taught all of us.

So I say to you, let us live life.

Let’s live like Jennifer lived.

Live. And do good in this world. We love you Jenny. Your legacy will live on.