Two Months

Two months ago my kitchen looked like this.

And then it looked like this ...

And then it looked like this ...

And now it looks like this ...

And I would go back to picture to the top just to have one more moment with HER.

I lost my Nan and thus gained a kitchen.  It seems rather trite to even post.  

But thank you Nan.  Thank you for thinking of me.  Thank you for my new kitchen. 

I think of you every single day.

PS especially thanks for the dishwasher.  Its been a long year with 6 kids and no dishwasher and honestly, I am very, very grateful.

We made her proud

The funeral was hard. Very hard and at the same time very wonderful. I think, I hope, we honored her memory in the way she would have wished.

I cannot begin to express my gratitude for my friends and family that made the effort to be there for the day. To stand beside us at the graveside. To listen to her eulogies. To hold my hand. To pass me kleenex. To make sure I napped and ate and laughed.

She is free of pain and age and grief and we will carry on in her honor because she wouldn't expect anything less from us.

I am who I am in so many ways because of the woman she was.

Rest In Peace My Nan

November 22, 1925 - March 28, 2009

Agnes Brandon.

Daughter, Sister, Mother, Grandmother, Great-Grandmother, Aunt

Once again I have no words to express the depth of this loss in my life. She is free now. Free of pain, free of fear, free of the horror she felt as she lost her capacities. And I will miss her forever. My Nan. My boys Grandma-Nan.

I love you. I hope to be the type of woman you always saw me as. I love you Nan. So much. I am not ready for you to be gone.

The Gift of Time

Our visit was precious, wonderful and worth every tear.

It was goodbye. Hugs, tears and death bed promises asked and made. She told me to be a "good grandma" one day so I can be as lucky as her. She reminded me of how blessed I am with the family I have. She held my sister and I close and shed tears of grief of the loss about to come, and tears of joy for all we have shared together.

We laughed. We giggled. We ate. We cried. We reminisced. We sang. We listened. We talked.

We played crib. She skunked me. Twice.

We prayed.

She is ready to see heaven, but I am not ready to let her go. This dance of letting go and holding on is tragic. Brutal. Heart breaking. And at the same time, beautiful.

Beautiful to have a chance to celebrate her life with her while she is still aware of what she means to us, and us to her. Beautiful to KNOW that this time I have a chance to say what I need to.

To say good bye. Thank You. I love you. You have taught me all you needed to teach me. I will be ok. I will keep your legacy going. I will never forget you. Your memory is alive with me. It's ok, you don't need to be afraid.

All those the words I whispered in her ear, while inside I was screaming "Not Yet! Please God. Please Nan, NOT YET! You might be ready, but I am not. I need you, please, I need you. I need you as you were. I need your advice, your wisdom, your unconditional love. I need my Nan."

But she is not who she was. She suffers now and wants to go home. To see her daughter, grand daughter, husband, mother, sisters and brothers, friends and her Savior who wait for her. She talks of the curtain she dreams about with the light behind it. Of pulling back that curtain and not being able to see out it yet, but knowing its beautiful and bright. She wants to go. And I hold tight to the memory of the time when she was fully present and I celebrate that. Because I love her, I tell her what she needs to hear. It's ok to go. We will be ok. But I wonder.

And the present calls me back and I watch my sons gently show her love while she so gently offers it in return. I want them to remember her. Her little parties, their sleepovers at her house. The $5 that came in the mail for "an ice cream with your mom" every few months. The card games she so patiently taught, and then lost, for their sake. Her pictures of them that invariably had a thumb in the middle. Her legacy of college funds for each of the 8 great grandsons saved out of her own self sacrifice. She has loved them all. Equally treasuring them and honoring them. For Tanner's gentle nature. Eric's beautiful smile. Greg's love of hockey. Caden's love to snuggle. She is a GREAT, Great-Grandma. And she is so loved.

She is not a perfect woman. She made mistakes. She has had a very hard life full of losses that I can't imagine surviving. But she is my Nan and I love her.

Life without her presence is unimaginable. If one day I am as precious to my grandchildren as she is to me I will truly be a successful woman in the only way that matters.

Living on a precipice

Its hard to put into words what life feels like right now.

On edge? Teetering? An infinite pause?

We sit and wait. We celebrate the fact that end isn't here, but we all breathe shallowly because we know its close.

I grasp at hope that I might get another visit, another few days together, and carry the reality that I really shouldn't count on it. I need to be ok if I don't. I have said what I needed to say. And still I hope.

And we focus now on the visits. The memories. The pictures. We laugh and reminisce.

We talk in circles around the idea of a funeral. Burial.

But what we all avoid is the reality of the shattering that will occur when we are plunged off that precipice. There will be no going back. No holding it together. No repairing the damage.

She is the glue that has held us together. The reason we hold on to our facade of a family. For her, we try.

My heart will break. And then my family will crack along the lines of difficult relationships.

And we wait. Until today? Tomorrow? Another week? Another month?

We sit upon this precipice of death.