from Scott Burnside of The Athletic,

It​ was spring 2011​ when​ Bekki​ Nill began​ preparing​ to​ die.

There​ was​ a sense​ of​​ calm as she packaged up clothes and shoes that she knew neighbors and friends found attractive.

Friends, some close, some not, many connected through her long involvement with the hockey community, came to visit on days between chemotherapy sessions. Even though Nill knew they were coming ostensibly to say goodbye, she was comforted by the visits.

One day she sat in the backyard in the Detroit area home she shared with her husband, Jim Nill, now the GM of the Dallas Stars but then a senior executive with the Red Wings.

“It was a beautiful day, the birds were chirping and I’m like, I’m going to record these storybooks for these grandkids that I don’t even know but I know that are going to be here and I’m going to miss those opportunities, so I’m just going to set things up for me not being here,” recalled Nill, a mother of three and now grandmother to two toddlers. “And so for a couple of months I planned on preparing to die.”

More than seven years have passed since doctors told the Nill family that Bekki had two-to-four months to live.

And on this night, she sits in a double-suite at the American Airlines Center, arriving with armloads of gift bags for the 17 cancer survivors and their friends or family who will soon arrive to one of the cancer survivors’ nights Bekki organizes at Dallas Stars’ games.

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