Back in November during the one weekend I had off for at least six weeks on either side of it, I got on a plane and flew 600 miles south of us. My brother kept telling me that my 95 year-old grandfather was fading fast and that if I wanted to see him, I should do it. I kept getting this message from various members of my family until finally Z and I decided to go. So down we went. Since we were already heading south, we decided we should visit my maternal grandmother who also lives nearbye-ish. It'd been awhile since I'd seen her, and she was always saying that we never visited. So we went. And we stayed for one night. We jumped up and did the dishes on queue. We cleaned up the $50 of steak her dog threw up. We stripped the sheets from our bed and started the wash machine before we left. We did or duty, and because we both had to work on Monday, we couldn't stay long. But we did it.
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Sunday, March 31, 2013
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Family Matters
At some point in college or quickly thereafter, the way my family communicates stopped working for me. I've known this on an emotional level but never on a level where I could put terms and definitions to it. And even in its unpleasantness we could interact fairly well. We work together. I lived with them for almost a year after moving back from Portland. Holidays are pretty OK. But I still feel it. I'm exhausted in my childhood home. In family gatherings I feel like I am speaking a language that all of my friends understand completely but these people who raised me can't.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Oooooh, this makes so much sense NOW.
It is fascinating being on this side of the wedding planning line. My sister got engaged last week, and tonight I saw her for the first time post engagement. I went in with a list of self imposed rules: No asking about wedding plans unless she brought it up (asking about the proposal and all of that, totally fine.) No sentences that start with charged sentiment like, "You know what's a great idea..." or "It'd be great if..."
Thursday, July 8, 2010
The History Teller
We have all run into that old woman in the grocery store. "When I was young," launches a thousand words, strung together about days of yore. But not your days of yore. Nor the person next to you. And after the story ceases there is kind of no place to go. Yeah, you can ask them more about that history but because it's a personal history the dynamic is question (you) answer (them.) It is not an actual conversation. And you realize that pretty quickly and are eaten by awkwardness. That awkwardness illuminates the trouble with this trait: it isolates the teller. They feel they are *sharing* something with you but really they are removing themselves from you even if just a little.
Half of my family is story tellers. The other half is 100% not. If you're not careful, paternal family reunions can be one Homer-esque telling of the same stories you heard the last time you got together. As kids I remember LOVING these stories. As an adult I cringe. They leave nothing to actually converse about. It's like attending a lecture of one. On one side Dad at the podium. At the other side you in a soft folding chair watching the wall clock.
Half of my family is story tellers. The other half is 100% not. If you're not careful, paternal family reunions can be one Homer-esque telling of the same stories you heard the last time you got together. As kids I remember LOVING these stories. As an adult I cringe. They leave nothing to actually converse about. It's like attending a lecture of one. On one side Dad at the podium. At the other side you in a soft folding chair watching the wall clock.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Parent Protocal
Interaction with Mom:
Mom tells me a story about this lavish wedding where the family did all this work, it ended up raining...like monsoon type of rain, the bride reacted so horribly that the father (owner of the yard) ended up not even attending the wedding. (And she is in noooo way hinting I will be like this with this story. It's told neutrally.)
Me: That's horrible. If it rains for us, we will put on our REI jackets, hand out umbrellas and take pictures of us laughing through it all.
Mom: You can't find umbrellas this time of year.
Mom tells me a story about this lavish wedding where the family did all this work, it ended up raining...like monsoon type of rain, the bride reacted so horribly that the father (owner of the yard) ended up not even attending the wedding. (And she is in noooo way hinting I will be like this with this story. It's told neutrally.)
Me: That's horrible. If it rains for us, we will put on our REI jackets, hand out umbrellas and take pictures of us laughing through it all.
Mom: You can't find umbrellas this time of year.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Out of Town Guests
My maternal Grandmother is probably boarding a plane right now to San Fransisco. I hadn't realized how old she was. You know how you see those pictures of you as a baby in the arms of some half zombiefied great grandparent you don't remember and you think your grandparents, the ones who played soccer with you and watched plays and ran around in mock dino battle could never share that half conscious expression. And then your grandmother, half hunched, surveys a step and begins the slow decent and you realize, you realize that age misses no one. And you can guess that your Mother is keenly aware of the same truth but for very different reasons.
I don't know if my Grandmother started the knot or is still untangling the fine work of her mother or the mother before that but almost every characteristic that I am working on extricating from myself springs directly from that source. That seems harsh and isn't within the truth of the matter but here, picking and choosing words, I suppose I should be more careful. Grandma is an incredible inspiration. She and her husband built an incredibly successful business with their own hands. They were the ones who had us kids over for weekends. Grandma gave me my first painting lessons and encouraged me to be a dancer after I gave her an impromptu Christmas ballet performance to Beach Boy songs. (I have never taken ballet so, you can bet how good THAT was.) She is part of the family where a lot of my world view comes from. The paternal side always has their heads in the clouds. The maternal side feels the world through their hands and their feet on pavement. If I have work ethic, it comes from the maternal side. My love of the arts is from their encouragement.
I don't know if my Grandmother started the knot or is still untangling the fine work of her mother or the mother before that but almost every characteristic that I am working on extricating from myself springs directly from that source. That seems harsh and isn't within the truth of the matter but here, picking and choosing words, I suppose I should be more careful. Grandma is an incredible inspiration. She and her husband built an incredibly successful business with their own hands. They were the ones who had us kids over for weekends. Grandma gave me my first painting lessons and encouraged me to be a dancer after I gave her an impromptu Christmas ballet performance to Beach Boy songs. (I have never taken ballet so, you can bet how good THAT was.) She is part of the family where a lot of my world view comes from. The paternal side always has their heads in the clouds. The maternal side feels the world through their hands and their feet on pavement. If I have work ethic, it comes from the maternal side. My love of the arts is from their encouragement.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Sewing a Family History
So we got back this afternoon. After 3 days in supposed crime ridden Oakland, we came back to the stereo stolen out of our car parked in N Portland near the Max. Mostly it's just an annoyance. They'll be disappointed at its retail price. I'd like to think that all the taco bell cups I had strewn about the car made their process more difficult. Zach and I kept looking at the hole hoping it'd tell us the time. (It didn't.) The whole thing has provided a lot of jokes. I'd like to use the newly realized space for an in car fish tank. Terrible idea or pure genius. You decide.
Four days with an assortment of family left my limbs feeling like loose buttons hanging off an old sweater. Maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe I hoped of a repeat of the incredible experience Z and I felt at my maternal grandfather's memorial service. We discovered a family we never knew we had. I hoped for a similar story here with these cousins, but something about 30 plus members of our truly extended family shoved into my grandparents home was less than conducive to how I connect with people. So yeah. Fail. I spent most of the 5 hours making surface chit chat and being recognized by people whose names I could barely place. The only hiding spot was our single rental car. I watched as other cousins bonded and my sister had a great time interacting with her favorite uncles while I was nothing but awkward. The uncle I interacted with the most just proved that I officially don't like him. Officially. Again.
Buttons hanging off for dear life.
Four days with an assortment of family left my limbs feeling like loose buttons hanging off an old sweater. Maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe I hoped of a repeat of the incredible experience Z and I felt at my maternal grandfather's memorial service. We discovered a family we never knew we had. I hoped for a similar story here with these cousins, but something about 30 plus members of our truly extended family shoved into my grandparents home was less than conducive to how I connect with people. So yeah. Fail. I spent most of the 5 hours making surface chit chat and being recognized by people whose names I could barely place. The only hiding spot was our single rental car. I watched as other cousins bonded and my sister had a great time interacting with her favorite uncles while I was nothing but awkward. The uncle I interacted with the most just proved that I officially don't like him. Officially. Again.
Buttons hanging off for dear life.
Monday, February 8, 2010
The Sting of Reality
Today I had some things explained to me. Scary things. Things about money and life and decisions. Sometimes life is the running as fast as you can toward a cliff and then at some point closing your eyes and hoping, praying that your body will do its best at this great leap. We take so many great leaps...and they often aren't the ones we think they are. Moving in with Z was not a great leap. Marrying Z isn't one either. I am gliding merrily with my eyes open and creased with smile lines. No leaping involved. Music, however, is one for me. Asking people to help me create something like a short film is one too. However, currently, I am standing at the sidelines watching my parents take a deep breath before they begin to build up speed. Sometimes living is scary. Money. Life. And decisions. Theirs make mine look so effortless. As if I am out for a summer stroll.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Walking into Dawn
(*Note: I wrote this a few days ago. If it disappears in a day or two, pay no mind.)
If you looked across any place I spend much time you'd find an anthropological study about my genetic line. The stacks of dishes, the groupings of coffee cups, the piles of clothes, the binder of environmental news clippings. That is a line that threads back through my genes, through my parent's and to my paternal grandparents. And so it is hard this week looking at the dishes, the cups, the clothing and the clippings to not think about the part of my family we lost last week.
If you looked across any place I spend much time you'd find an anthropological study about my genetic line. The stacks of dishes, the groupings of coffee cups, the piles of clothes, the binder of environmental news clippings. That is a line that threads back through my genes, through my parent's and to my paternal grandparents. And so it is hard this week looking at the dishes, the cups, the clothing and the clippings to not think about the part of my family we lost last week.
Labels:
family,
the best kind of love,
things that scare you
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
This Plus That Actually Equals Zero
Two posts in one day, right?
I take notes during my weekly work meeting. After the meeting I type them up in a Google doc and send them off to people. I've set the privacy settings so that they don't even have to sign in to use. But after yesterday's meeting I get an email from my Mom. It reads:
"I can't make this work but for now it's okay."
I looked at the note for a few minutes trying to figure out why I was confused. Then I realized that the note didn't directly call for an action. If it was asking for help, it needed to ask for it. But she wasn't really asking for help. More like she was saying, "I might need help later." It was prepping me for a later help request.
I take notes during my weekly work meeting. After the meeting I type them up in a Google doc and send them off to people. I've set the privacy settings so that they don't even have to sign in to use. But after yesterday's meeting I get an email from my Mom. It reads:
"I can't make this work but for now it's okay."
I looked at the note for a few minutes trying to figure out why I was confused. Then I realized that the note didn't directly call for an action. If it was asking for help, it needed to ask for it. But she wasn't really asking for help. More like she was saying, "I might need help later." It was prepping me for a later help request.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Face Punch
Two interactions that meant one thing but came off as totally different:
1. After the show on Sunday, I walked up to two theater friends. One is directing an upcoming show at the community theater. Months ago he emailed me and asked if I'd help out his step daughter with the poster for the show. I emailed him back and said yes. Told him to send her my email address and have her get in contact with me. I've heard nothing back. At all. So when I see him on Sunday the first thing he says to me, with a big grin on his face, "So you're working hard on that poster, I see. I see you got back to me right away." Or something similar that directly implied that I had ignored his email and it was somehow my fault for not pursuing HIS project after I put the ball back in HIS court.
1. After the show on Sunday, I walked up to two theater friends. One is directing an upcoming show at the community theater. Months ago he emailed me and asked if I'd help out his step daughter with the poster for the show. I emailed him back and said yes. Told him to send her my email address and have her get in contact with me. I've heard nothing back. At all. So when I see him on Sunday the first thing he says to me, with a big grin on his face, "So you're working hard on that poster, I see. I see you got back to me right away." Or something similar that directly implied that I had ignored his email and it was somehow my fault for not pursuing HIS project after I put the ball back in HIS court.
Monday, September 14, 2009
He's Fine.
I began thinking about my vows on the bike ride in this morning. One of the things I hope to do for Zach is to be healthy. I promise him that I will take care of myself physically and mentally so that I can be around as long as possible for and with him. This idea isn't a new one to me, but this morning it had particular importance because this morning at 7:30 I got a call from my Mom saying that while everything was fine, Dad was in the hospital.
Dad threw out his back two weekends ago. Then Saturday he did it again. Just by bending over. Nothing more. And this is the insidious thing about a pulled back. So Mom plopped him down in the guest room with a book and a remote control.
This morning Dad tried to get up for his usual routine and around 6:30 I guess he told Mom that he was blacking out. She said he was holding his chest and his eyes were rolling up back in his head. She called an ambulance and when I got the 7:30 call, she was at the hospital. I guess he's in serious pain but can still crack totally stupid jokes. (Ah Dad.)
After she got home around 9am, the hospital called and said they want to keep him for 24 hours to watch his heart. It wasn't a heart attack as far as I know (it was probably severe pain and dehydration) but I guess it's always a little irregular and since he's there, they want to keep an eye on him.
So what does this have to do with health? My dad isn't healthy. Genetics (and testosterone) have been good to him and only in the last 5-7 years has he really had to watch his weight. He doesn't understand the real reason to eat a vegetable. (Even I'm fairly new to this form of thinking.) Health doesn't actually have anything to do with size. Health has to do with health. Sometimes size may make a comment about health, but health is still it's own thing. You can be skinny and still unhealthy.
Dad is no longer skinny, but he's not as heavy as he should be for how he treats his body. He's hard on it. He physically works like a mad man for 8 hour days during the weekends, but then sits at a computer the rest of the week. He eats peanut butter and tater tots for meals. He drinks just a little too much beer.
I love peanut butter and beer. But unlike my Dad I'm not going to fight my partner when they suggest I eat a green bean. Marriage is about commitments, and one of them is the physical. We get so wrapped up in the vanity of our bodies. "I hope I don't grow fat so that you still find me desirable" or some other crap. It should be, "I promise to try and eat real meals with real nutrients so we have the best odds possible at longevity."
Health is hard. It's really fucking hard. But work on it not to fit some ideal, but because you owe it to your friends and family. I owe it to my friends and family. Who knows if this is a wake up call for Dad. However, it may be part of my wake up call.
Dad threw out his back two weekends ago. Then Saturday he did it again. Just by bending over. Nothing more. And this is the insidious thing about a pulled back. So Mom plopped him down in the guest room with a book and a remote control.
This morning Dad tried to get up for his usual routine and around 6:30 I guess he told Mom that he was blacking out. She said he was holding his chest and his eyes were rolling up back in his head. She called an ambulance and when I got the 7:30 call, she was at the hospital. I guess he's in serious pain but can still crack totally stupid jokes. (Ah Dad.)
After she got home around 9am, the hospital called and said they want to keep him for 24 hours to watch his heart. It wasn't a heart attack as far as I know (it was probably severe pain and dehydration) but I guess it's always a little irregular and since he's there, they want to keep an eye on him.
So what does this have to do with health? My dad isn't healthy. Genetics (and testosterone) have been good to him and only in the last 5-7 years has he really had to watch his weight. He doesn't understand the real reason to eat a vegetable. (Even I'm fairly new to this form of thinking.) Health doesn't actually have anything to do with size. Health has to do with health. Sometimes size may make a comment about health, but health is still it's own thing. You can be skinny and still unhealthy.
Dad is no longer skinny, but he's not as heavy as he should be for how he treats his body. He's hard on it. He physically works like a mad man for 8 hour days during the weekends, but then sits at a computer the rest of the week. He eats peanut butter and tater tots for meals. He drinks just a little too much beer.
I love peanut butter and beer. But unlike my Dad I'm not going to fight my partner when they suggest I eat a green bean. Marriage is about commitments, and one of them is the physical. We get so wrapped up in the vanity of our bodies. "I hope I don't grow fat so that you still find me desirable" or some other crap. It should be, "I promise to try and eat real meals with real nutrients so we have the best odds possible at longevity."
Health is hard. It's really fucking hard. But work on it not to fit some ideal, but because you owe it to your friends and family. I owe it to my friends and family. Who knows if this is a wake up call for Dad. However, it may be part of my wake up call.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
A Chicken in a Road
I've never been an anti meat vegetarian. I don't make snide comments. I don't get grossed out by chicken on fine display. I have my opinions and I keep them mostly quiet unless brought out by thoughtful conversation. And I've been totally fine with the fact that my parents are slowly heading back into meat. They have the occasional tuna salad sandwich. They eat the luncheon meats we get for visiting artists. My dad can enjoy a salmon or steak at a restaurant. BUT. I was dumbfounded (DUMBFOUNDED) by the giant tub of Kentucky Fried Chicken that greeted me upon opening my parents' refrigerator this morning. Kentucky Fried Chicken? Really?
Speechless.
(But not so speechless that I can't confess that the fries I had with my veggie burger meal at Burger King last night were delicious!)
*sigh*
Speechless.
(But not so speechless that I can't confess that the fries I had with my veggie burger meal at Burger King last night were delicious!)
*sigh*
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Diamond Lake, or, Mosquito Land
We have few traditions, my family. Besides guilt, the neighborhood Christmas eve party and starting businesses, we don't follow many things year to year. With one more exception: Diamond Lake. We've been going to Diamond Lake forever. We all learned to ride our bikes there. We know the history of the lake. We recall with sadness when the algae blooms made swimming impossible. We all hated when they drained the lake and then filled it with chemicals to kill the invasive Chub. We remember these things b/c they are a part of our history as well.
Zach finally entered that history.
We only stayed for a few days. My parents are up there until Wednesday, but we decided to take what we could and head south for the weekend. It took a lot of self control to not spend the entire time filling him in on all the trips he hadn't been a part of. We did OK.
I only wish we could have been there longer. With fewer bugs. The mosquitoes made us abandon my parents and head back down Mt. Thielson and then hike the hwy 90-minutes on foot back to our cabin. Also tiny gnats destroyed our bike trip around the lake. We tore through clouds of them. Thousands of their little bodies blinding us as we pushed through onto the next cloud.
So fewer bugs. More time. But hopefully this won't be the last time he's out there with us. And it's kind of exciting that he's been folded into one more piece of our family.
Zach finally entered that history.
We only stayed for a few days. My parents are up there until Wednesday, but we decided to take what we could and head south for the weekend. It took a lot of self control to not spend the entire time filling him in on all the trips he hadn't been a part of. We did OK.
I only wish we could have been there longer. With fewer bugs. The mosquitoes made us abandon my parents and head back down Mt. Thielson and then hike the hwy 90-minutes on foot back to our cabin. Also tiny gnats destroyed our bike trip around the lake. We tore through clouds of them. Thousands of their little bodies blinding us as we pushed through onto the next cloud.
So fewer bugs. More time. But hopefully this won't be the last time he's out there with us. And it's kind of exciting that he's been folded into one more piece of our family.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
The Project
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A lot of the shots here don't really tell a story. But the workshop was a macro lens paradise. It combined two of my favorite elements: type and tiny. If I had been on my own I would have stayed an hour after the class finished on Sunday and just taken pictures with all the type. Drawers and drawers of glorious type.
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We added layers of texture to our area. The thicker the texture the darker that part of the plate would print. The the lighter the texture the lighter that part of the plate would print. You really have to learn to think about things in a certain way.
You can see the varying tones. That just means how much ink was on the rollers. We probably reapplied right after a few of those.

So you print all your pages with the pressure plate. Then you take your type and you put it all in the bed of the press. My type was 72 font and like 6 letters. Some type was 10point and over a hundred.
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Look at the image where you can see the word "cat." Notice there there seems to be the letters. Then surround to the immediate left and right of the letters are metal pieces to make sure the type only goes so wide (the width of the section we each had to work with.) Then between all those chunks of metal and type we put what's called furniture. Wood blocks to fill out the rest of the space in the press bed.
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If you look at the whole press bed you can see sections of type and sections of furniture.
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Then you mix your type's ink and put it on the roller and run through (by hand) all your sheets again and wallah.
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I no longer feel bad about spending $7 on a letterpress card.
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Tuesday, March 3, 2009
The Coming Dawn
I heard a woman by the name of Jane Brody on a podcast of the Diane Rhem's show today. Her book, "Jane Brody's Guide to the Great Beyond" is about end of life care and how each of us can prepare ourselves and our loved ones. I think about this issue a fair amount. Not in the sad sense of grieving my future demise but in the practical way. It amazes me how death is such a silent force in so much of what we do, but we seal it off from our lives. Death always takes us by surprise...yet we all know it's going to happen.
Maybe that's the equation and there is no way around it. But I think in the least, we can be realistic about the complications death inevitably brings. We can prepare for some of that and hopefully lessen the burden on those we've left behind.
A few things Ms. Brody suggested:
1. A living will saying how you want to die. If you want to be resuscitated, etc.
2. Suggests letting people know about your end of life wishes. That way everyone is on the same page. This also alleviates a lot of the burden or guilt. As young people, we don't think this is necessary, but if something were to ever happen to us, we need to give our parents the same assistance of knowing our wishes as we'd want from them.
3. When discussing treatments and serious diseases take a tape recorder to doctor's appointment. At the minimum take written notes. Try and bring a loved one along just so there are two sets of ears listening. Different people will hear different things.
4. Hospice. Apparently hospices are free and a lot of the services they offer (grief counseling for example) are free. Everyone who called in couldn't say enough positive thing about hospices. I realized I know very little.
5. She said that many doctors disappear when they realize they can't do anything to save their patient. Doctors study saving lives...not death. She suggested thanking the doctor for all the work he's done and telling him that you want him there until the end.
Right now my grandfather of 85 is set for 22 days straight of radiation therapy for metastasized cancer. (That's a whole other story.) He is in the late stages of Alzheimer's and lives with his care taker far away from those that knew him in his previous life. He probably wouldn't recognize us. The last time I saw him the birthday cake we had for him really only brought fear. Did he recognize us? I don't know. But it begs the question, "What is the point in the radiation?"
In telling all of this to my mother, my Grandmother said, "Well we can't just let him die." And that's what it would feel like if we didn't go forward with treatment. It would feel like we were just letting him die. That we had abandoned him. But what if he wants to die. What if this strong man who spent his entire life bucking authority and being smarter than anyone around him, never wanted to be like this. But we don't know. We can only make guesses as well as a family can when they are huddled between forces of love and guilt and uncertainty.
* * *
My Dad's mother has this hand written on an 8 1/2 x 11 piece of printer paper and taped to a wall next to a window. Wall space is hard to find at their house as everything is covered with Bible verses, quotations and pictures of sunsets. I've always loved this particular one though:
"Death is not extinguishing the light; it is putting out the lamp because dawn has come."
-Rabindranath Tagore
Maybe that's the equation and there is no way around it. But I think in the least, we can be realistic about the complications death inevitably brings. We can prepare for some of that and hopefully lessen the burden on those we've left behind.
A few things Ms. Brody suggested:
1. A living will saying how you want to die. If you want to be resuscitated, etc.
2. Suggests letting people know about your end of life wishes. That way everyone is on the same page. This also alleviates a lot of the burden or guilt. As young people, we don't think this is necessary, but if something were to ever happen to us, we need to give our parents the same assistance of knowing our wishes as we'd want from them.
3. When discussing treatments and serious diseases take a tape recorder to doctor's appointment. At the minimum take written notes. Try and bring a loved one along just so there are two sets of ears listening. Different people will hear different things.
4. Hospice. Apparently hospices are free and a lot of the services they offer (grief counseling for example) are free. Everyone who called in couldn't say enough positive thing about hospices. I realized I know very little.
5. She said that many doctors disappear when they realize they can't do anything to save their patient. Doctors study saving lives...not death. She suggested thanking the doctor for all the work he's done and telling him that you want him there until the end.
Right now my grandfather of 85 is set for 22 days straight of radiation therapy for metastasized cancer. (That's a whole other story.) He is in the late stages of Alzheimer's and lives with his care taker far away from those that knew him in his previous life. He probably wouldn't recognize us. The last time I saw him the birthday cake we had for him really only brought fear. Did he recognize us? I don't know. But it begs the question, "What is the point in the radiation?"
In telling all of this to my mother, my Grandmother said, "Well we can't just let him die." And that's what it would feel like if we didn't go forward with treatment. It would feel like we were just letting him die. That we had abandoned him. But what if he wants to die. What if this strong man who spent his entire life bucking authority and being smarter than anyone around him, never wanted to be like this. But we don't know. We can only make guesses as well as a family can when they are huddled between forces of love and guilt and uncertainty.
* * *
My Dad's mother has this hand written on an 8 1/2 x 11 piece of printer paper and taped to a wall next to a window. Wall space is hard to find at their house as everything is covered with Bible verses, quotations and pictures of sunsets. I've always loved this particular one though:
"Death is not extinguishing the light; it is putting out the lamp because dawn has come."
-Rabindranath Tagore
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