10th February 2008

Kaleidoscope

posted in Family, Reader Input |

With a kaleidoscope, you turn the end of the tube ever so slightly, and the pattern shifts completely.  Life, right now, is a kaleidoscope.

For example:  I was driving up to Former State Capitol, almost to mom’s house, after 12 hours of traveling.  At a stop light, I ran my hand through my hair, and thought to myself:  “Hah!  Well, at least I got my hair cut a few weeks ago, so that’ll be okay with…”

And there was that shift:  My normal everyday “I’ve got to look neat and orderly when I show up at Grandma’s house” thought was stopped in its tracks.  No, I didn’t have to worry about whether my hair was tidy.

Another shift:  Mom, talking to me about her feelings right now, said that she had always thought of herself as younger than her compeers, because her mother was still alive.  And now, she said, now she is Eldest.  Suddenly the patterns in life have changed:  we don’t have a 104-year-old to judge our ages by, and mom, at  81, is, indeed, Eldest.

Another:  Driving up mom’s street, thinking about things to be done, I said to myself, “Well, after we run x errand and y errand, we can swing by…”

No.  We can’t swing by Grandma’s.

It isn’t grief.  It isn’t even deep sorrow.  These past few months have not been happy ones for Grandma.  Her world had shrunk again, suddenly, at the whim of outsiders–too frail for the assisted living center, so she had to go to a nursing home.  She didn’t like it.  She kept asking when she could go home.  She was tired.  The atmosphere there–though the staff are caring folk–was grim and depressing (at least to a visitor).  Last Stop.  Holding Pattern.  Her mind was wandering back into the past and then dipping into the present for a small time period, just long enough to know people who cared were there, but that she just Didn’t Like It.

So it was time.

Which leaves one feeling rather odd at all the condolences.  While it’s a shift, a change, a spot where a tooth has fallen out, as it were, mostly I feel relief.  Glad that Grandma didn’t have to spend a lot of time in a place that wasn’t hers, glad that she didn’t have to spend a lot of time in a half-there state, just aware enough  to realize that her vaunted awareness was slipping away.  Glad that we didn’t have to watch while she went through invasive medical procedures or faded completely away.

So people say, with love and caring, “I’m so sorry for your loss”, and I am left feeling rather awkward, wanting to say that, yes, it’s a loss, but at the same time, it’s not.  I feel that I said my goodbyes back in December…that’s when I cried, that’s when I burrowed my head into OmegaDad’s shoulder in bed and railed against mortality.

The kaleidoscope was already shifting from one pattern  to the next, but it hadn’t completed the shift yet.

Anyway, thank you all for your caring and kind words.  We will miss Grandma, but she was already on her way months ago, and so the grief and pain are muted, felt more as a momentary disjunction between old habits and routines and those of the future.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 10th, 2008 at 4:38 pm and is filed under Family, Reader Input. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

There are currently 9 responses to “Kaleidoscope”

  1. 1 On February 10th, 2008, Blog Antatonist said:

    I understand exactly what you mean. My grandmother died of complications of Alzheimer’s disease. She suffered with it a very long time before she died and when finally she passed away, she was something almost less than human. She would have hated to see herself that way. So though of course there was sadness, we were all very relieved that her suffering was over.

    You are lucky to have had your grandmother for so long. And from the posts I’ve read about her, she was an amazing woman.

  2. 2 On February 10th, 2008, lizard said:

    it is so difficult, all of it. I really feel for your mother, who of course could well live another 20 years (I sure hope so) but has that sense of being Eldest there, no matter. Of course, it will sink in. May she develop her sense of humor about it, learning to lord it over the rest of you, since she is in fact Eldest and thus deserving of even more respect. Dammit.

    I often think of how hard it is when someone dies while you are far away. When they are not part of your daily life, even the every now and then thoughts of telling them something are jarring, as you remember again that they are not there. It isn’t worse than when you are close by, of course, but it is different.

    I wish you all peace. You are well on your way, for sure, becasue you know that Margeurite is at peace.

  3. 3 On February 11th, 2008, Omega Unk said:

    Well and succinctly put.

    Unk

  4. 4 On February 11th, 2008, Julie Pippert said:

    Still, a (hug). Transitioning is hard.

  5. 5 On February 11th, 2008, Lauri said:

    Sending hugs your way… what a beautiful post

  6. 6 On February 11th, 2008, carosgram said:

    I understand what you mean. When my grandfather passed away at 95 I knew it was for the best. All of his siblings were gone and he was the eldest of 7. His friends had died, my grandmother 20 years ago. He no longer could see (macular degeneration) and he was bedridden after pneumonia 2 years before. He used to pray that God would take him. For him it was good and I didn’t grieve like I had for my father. But I still miss him, his advice and counsel. I miss his stories of what life was like when he was growing up. I miss walking around the cemetery with him as he told me about my relatives long past. I missed the shared history we had and the safe haven of love he represented. I can smile when I think about him but I wouldn’t mind if I could still drop by to see him once in a while.

  7. 7 On February 12th, 2008, Vinegar Martinis said:

    It’s not so much a ‘loss’ but it is a void and it still hurts. You and your family are in my thoughts and prayers.

  8. 8 On February 14th, 2008, pb said:

    It may not feel so much of a loss as a final destination. Much of your grief has already been invested, over the last days, weeks and years of your Grandmother’s decline.

    You will grieve again, once the relief of “having it over with” passes. Be kind to yourself; you deserve it. God bless.

  9. 9 On February 21st, 2008, Lane said:

    Thanks for that…from one of the other grandotters.

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