Saying Good-bye

Loss.  It is universal to every breathing thing, and yet, it is one of the most personal experiences on our journey.  

Two weeks ago, I was in the hospital with my grandma.  She lived with my family for the last three and a half years, and Monday morning, February 20, 2012 at 5 a.m. we watched her pass into eternity.  All night I was taking shifts with other family members, holding her hand to just let her know we were there and that we were so grateful for her life.  Her final breath still seems like a dream.  We knew it was coming, but I don't know how you can prepare for that.   

She was exactly ninety-one and a half the day she died, and her life was well lived.  We were so blessed by the fact that her memory and cognitive skills remained completely intact.  There is no money that could ever buy the stories that she passed on to us, stories in which I find an incredible legacy that I get to carry with me forever.  

Still, even when the good-bye is to someone who has lived a full life, it is still so difficult.  At least for me.  As I was cleaning out the family refrigerator a few days ago, I was on a frenzy of throwing things in the trash.  People say that grief makes you want to do that sometimes.  But then I came across a package of bologna, and even though no one else in my family eats that, it was hard to throw it in the trash.  It was another moment of admitting that Nanny is not coming back.  

In the morning, I still wake up thinking I need to make sure she has her oatmeal before 10:30 am and that she will need a fresh cup of coffee.  I still come home from work wanting to tell her about my day and ask her advice on different problems I run into.  In so many ways, she was more than just a grandma.  When both my parents lost their job at the end of last year, we were sent into a spin of emotions filled with fear and sadness.  Yet Nanny was there, our biggest defender, our best friend.  She never gave up on any of us, not even my dad, who a lot of people gave up on in a really short amount of time.  

I will miss her so much.  I will miss telling her about my boy drama, or more so my lack of boy drama, to which she would always reiterate, "Don't rush into things.  Just do what you are doing, and it will happen.  Don't worry about it!"  But usually that advice would quickly be followed by, "You could always go to a military ball!  Isn't the Naval Academy close by?" and I would just laugh and say, "Maybe I'll do that, Nanny."  I will miss eating breakfast with her in the mornings.  I will miss her giving me advice on my job search, and letting me know that one day I will be at the top of whatever field I want to pursue. She always thought like that--that we had what it took to be excellent and to use that influence to make a difference in the world.  I'll miss how on hard days after my family went through the trauma of a church split and the loss of friendships, she would tell me to just curl up in her bed and talk to her about it, and unlike my parents who would quickly want me to forgive people, she would, for a second, let me be totally angry at how things went down.  I will miss her feisty opinions and the way she seemed to purposefully try to generate heated conversation.  I will miss watching her come to the aid of the underdog time after time after time.  I will miss her laugh and the fact that she refused to wear her dentures.  I will miss taking her to mass every once in a while on Saturday nights, and the peace that was in her room because she was a woman who knew how to pray.  I will miss her opinions of the current GOP debates and the blaring of every evening FOX news show as I was trying to sleep in a room down the hall.  I will miss filming random conversations with her.  

People say that after losing someone, you always wish that you could have had just one more conversation, one more moment, one more memory.  It's hard to come to terms with the fact that she and I won't be going to see Iron Lady like we planned, or that she won't be giving me grammar lessons like we talked about. There is a space in our lives that she filled so beautifully, and now that it feels empty, it is a whole new journey of grappling with the very human experience of letting go.  

All I know is that in the midst of working through the unformulated and messy process of grief, I am so incredibly thankful that I had the privilege of knowing Nanny in a way that never would have happened if she didn't decide to live with us.  I'm not sure why she chose that--maybe the whole underdog thing again--but I will forever be grateful for the time I had with her.