Good-Bye, Mary Lou

January 10, 2006 Long Islanders awoke to a stunningfront page headline: A Last Smile. Husband recallsharrowing rock slide that killed L.I. woman on nextdays climb. The full cover photo depicted Mary LouSammis, her husband and three adult children smilingwith Mount Kilimanjaro backlit behind them. Theywere bundled up, exhausted, and anxiously anticipatingtomorrows summit to the Roof of Africa. Twenty fourhours later she was struck and killed in a deadly boulderbombardment. Her family was left to reconstruct theirshattered lives.Good-bye Mary Lou is at once a tribute to anextraordinary, vivacious woman, an adventure storythat ends tragically at seventeen thousand feet onfabled Mount Kilimanjaro, a love story of a perfectyoung marriage which struggles, nearly breaks, andregrows stronger than ever, and a spiritual journeyof cremation, grieving, desperate loneliness, andsurprising contact with Mary Lou after death.