Old places, new themes

My grandmother is dying today. After lots of heart trouble, they are taking her home where she can be at peace when she goes. It's all the way in Michigan, and I wish I were there right now. Every second of every day since she had the first heart attack. I feel trapped and helpless, waiting for the dark inevitable. I know that it's just life and that it's natural...Circle of life and all that crap. And it hurts a bit for me, but it hurts way more knowing that my father is losing his mother. I can't bear his grief.

It's also got me thinking: because I never saw her in the hospital...I never got a chance to really say a final goodbye...all I have are memories. Up to this point, she has been a fixture, as sure as I will see the moon in the sky at night, grandma will be there when I go home for visits. And if she's not, it's only because she's at the grocery store and will be back presently. But this....This is different... Now I will go home and there will be a shroud where once there was a veil. There will be sadness where once there was celebration and love. And there will be no grandma. It's like when they sell your childhood home. The people are the same...But it's no longer your home. Kinda the same thing. The house is the same...But it's no longer a home without grandma in it. It's so odd, isn't it? The way we imagine things...The way we connect with people... I sat yesterday in the woods and cried and talked to her a long time. I told her how sorry I was that I couldn't come say goodbye and hold her hand one last time. I truly believe she was there. I truly believe she heard me somehow.

I know this illness stretched on for weeks...About a month, now, I think, actually....But to me, it will be as sudden as blowing out a candle. One moment in time she was there, the next she was not. There will be the time before, when she was in the memories; and the time after, when she was gone. New faces, new places. Old places, new themes.

Funny ole' world, isn't it?