Grieving and Death

It was sad, of course. Funerals are sad.

We cried, not for our own sorrow and pain. Watching her sisters stand over her open casket; watching her sons and daughters (our aunts and uncles) huddle near the simple pine box, looking over her; our cousin, young son in her arms, the questions on his face, her having to explain death. Explain that Great-Grandma was sleeping, a forever sleep.

We cried for them, the immeasurable pain they must feel. The memories that must have been going through their mind, a lifetime of them. She was the oldest child in her family, he sisters don't remember a day of life without her, and of course nor do her children. All those memories, it's all that is left.

Dad took us to the casket, with his arms around us, said he'd read what we wrote about Grandma the other day, and he said it was really good. We stood looking at her, and so many thing go through our head. She didn't look like grandma, not really. Skin smooth, no more black and blue shades of old age of her, she looked in a way we had never seen her. We shed a few tears, remembering the smells of bacon cooked in a cast-iron pan on a wood stove and peculated coffee, exactly what Grandma's house smelled like all the time; Grandma's letters sent no matter where you were in the world; quilts she made each of her Grandchildren for graduation, always so proud to show you her progress, hoping she'd complete them before the big day, some years that meant up to four of them; photos of her flowers, and Grandpa's garden produce, always happy to show a visitor. Always coffee ready, food to be eaten, and love to be given.

Now she's gone.

It was a long day, there was crying all around, of course, and lots of laughing. There is always lots of laughing in our family. She went to be with Grandpa, if you are a believer, and so how is that not a joyous occasion.

Not really sure the proper way to grieve, collectively. When Grandpa passed there was spontaneous bouts of sobbing; but his death was sudden, and unexpected, and Grandma's was a long progression to the pearly gates. Perhaps there is no consistent way to grieve, the passing of each person is just...different, and so each case is met with different feelings and ways to get past them. We don't remember grieving for our maternal grandparents.

We didn't attend our maternal grandmothers' funeral, it was many years ago. We were her only granddaughter, only one of three grandchildren. We are ashamed to say we didn't like her. She was never nice, she was mean, and angry, she went almost a whole lifetime with un-medicated and undiagnosed mental illnesses; it wasn't until later in life she was diagnosed with disorders like OCD and schizophrenia. Maybe it wasn't always her fault that she was the way she was, but it left an impression on some of us that prevented us from feeling any real grief. She lived across the field from us for at least 10 years of our life, yet we barely knew much about her, other than she wasn't very nice, she was quick to anger, and didn't seem very nice or loving to Grandpa. It probably makes us a bad person in some people's eyes to write these things. So we'll stop.

Grieving and death. Does everybody deserve the same kind of regard in passing? After all, everybody dies, nobody is special in that. Some people die with nary a soul caring; homeless people, convicts, recluses, people considered generally bad, people with nobody, thousands in impoverished countries, and some of probably just as wonderful people, if not more, than those highly regarded in death. Some die and everybody seems to care; movie stars, beloved family members, children, affluent people. Who decided the level of respect, and grief, that anybodies death receives. Or is it a case of grieving for the sake of grieving.

Guess that last paragraph was...don't know...strange. The older a person gets, the closer they get to the end. Having had near-death experiences...maybe some of us are just desensitized, or maybe we're refusing to grieve...or maybe we have no idea what we are talking about and it's all going to come crashing down.

All we know is that when we write about her, we cry, and that might just be the only way we know how to grieve.

Carrying on a Legacy

Image Source

She may not have been a legend to the world, she was a legend to us. So was her husband.

Words that come to mind when we think of her are rebellious, young at heart, opinionated, and intelligent, stubborn.

Had she had her way, she would have went to University, would have taught English and writing to school children. She loved writing, she would write letters to everybody she knew. She loved getting letters, she always said she especially liked ours. We have a feeling we were one of her only grandchildren who regularly wrote letters to her, but because we had always been on the move and travelling after graduation, we usually had interesting things to write to her. Sometimes she would "mark" our letters, and show them to us when we would visit her.

Instead of following her dream, she changed her dream. She married and made a happy home for her husband, they had been high school sweethearts, had a marriage to pattern one's own from. She grew her own vegetables, tended flowers, and was active in the community, raising seven strapping children on shoe string budgets.

Today, almost three years to the day since Grandpa crawled down from his deer stand, was admitted to the hospital diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and within weeks passed away, she went to meet him in her heaven.

Her legacy was one of food, cooking, words, gardening. loving your neighbour. She wasn't perfect, of course, but she was a lovely woman.

We saw her about a month ago, our last memory of her will be sitting next to her in the nursing home, during an annual family gathering, holding her hand, listening to her talk about the people around her, and talking aimlessly about bits and pieces from the past. We are sure she was a bit confused with what she saw, our family has become very multi-cultural because of adoptions and foster care, and it had been awhile since she had even recognized some of her own grandchildren, us included.

Each time we told her we had to go, and kissed her cheek, she'd clasp our hands more firmly, indicating she didn't want us to leave. It made us giggle and smile, which in turn made her smile. We lay our head on her frail small shoulder one last time, and told her that we love her, and that we would see her soon. As we walked out we knew we probably wouldn't.

She went into intensive care last week, and family members went to see her but we were told too late to make the trip. We were told she asked for us.

Her passing is no surprise, of course. She has been in so much pain that they sedated her the last couple of days because even morphine wouldn't take her pain away. Her life will be remembered; her passing, the end of a generation that held traditions and values that are disappearing from this country; but the disappearances need not be a scary thing, like death, change is inevitable and part of life, and it doesn't mean that the new traditions and values will be bad, it just means they will be different.

Some, part of a Legacy, that will be carried on.

With the passing of our last grandparent, many of us shall continue to blend our own modern views and values, with their traditional practices of self sustainability and compassion for others.

Rest in peace, Grandma. You shall be missed by many. (P.S. and just in case you are right, give Grandpa a hug and kiss for us)

~ Frank et al

Some of the other stuff we've written over the year about Grandma:

• January 15, 2012 A Visit With Grandma http://just-call-me-frank.blogspot.com/2012/01/visit-with-grandma.html
• June 23, 2012 A Family Picnic Day http://just-call-me-frank.blogspot.com/2012/06/family-picnic-day.html
• October 6, 2012 Just A General How Do You Do http://just-call-me-frank.blogspot.com/2012/10/just-general-how-do-you-do.html

Home Safe and Rambling

Made it home safe, after driving through many a countryside with water washed over the road. The exhaust system on the car cacked out on the first long dirt road we hit early in the day, and so now you can hear us coming half a mile away, literally. The car is old though and we've put over 5,000 miles on it this month, so, the poor thing, what can we expect.

We have pictures of the water covered roads, but honestly we're a little to tired to go look for the cord to attach to the computer to take them off of the device.

Saturday we might be on a mini-roadtrip again, a family picnic.
We haven't been to one of those in...years. Grandma is ill, one of the aunts has given her a week or so to live (a few of our aunts are nurses). She was found passed out this last week in her room, blue. She's been on oxygen for awhile and hasn't been doing well since Grandpa passed, she's been slowly getting worse.

We did some more property hunting before getting home, looking at four in total, two we really liked (one had just gotten an offer, however), one that was a straight "no", and one that may have been too far in the country (not near any "large" city) to meet our complete needs.

Our dream property, which we plan to put an offer on, is 40 acres of trees, pasture, and a nice sized yard with a big beautiful oak tree and a horseshoe driveway. Nice buildings and a house that was under remodel that needs to be finished. It would be nice if it turned in our favour, but we plan to start with an embarrassingly low offer. We can almost hear them laughing hundreds of miles away in the future. It's worth a try, though.

Mostly we've been good, mentally, from what we currently know. Quite a bit of anxiety, and a little anger, but it's all the usual really. No day is perfect, we just don't feel the need to say that the day was "only mildly suckie" most every day. There is no point in dwelling on the mundane misery, especially when we are creating a future for ourselves.

For now we dream, we dream big, we dream hopeful, we dream about our future, and we will not let disappointment break us down. At least not with this dream, right now. (We're trying to be inspirational for each other...)

We'll go now.

Mind Over Matter In Motion and More

**please note...sometimes these entries are to family members who read our blog, primarily The Father, while they may not be fascinating to you, it's both for our benefit, and that of people who care...if you don't, you know how to exit. We just want to remember and this is the way we do it. Writing Therapy.**

This weekend didn't turn out how we would have liked, but being used to disappointment and being apt to adapt to the flow of some things (we're not all good at it either) we were far less upset than James was. He just figures we deserve things to go the way we hope for them to go, at least some of the time. He is sweet to think that.

So we went to a village outside of the town where we are living temporarily, to meet his Nan (grandmother) and Uncle. Once we go there it was fine, albeit slightly uncomfortable because, well, when is meeting the significant others' family for the first time not uncomfortable. We survived. Somehow we made a good impression, according to the e-mail James received from his Uncle the following day. Yay! (something....)

The worst part was hands down the drive there. It vexed us for awhile, the experience we had.

"This doesn't bode well for the drive to Cumbria next weekend" James said, concern in his voice over our general demeanor in the car, as he adjusted his driving and instructed us to stop reading Twitter. (We're sure he hoped that it was the reason for our physical reactions to the car ride). He drives like a proper "young man".

You see, we have only been in a vehicle in England a couple of times, the first being on the main road, what Americans would call an Interstate, but what the British call a Motorway coming in from the airport, as one of his relatives drove and we sat in the backseat. While we had many seat gripping moments pass we handled that ride well. The a very short trip with Serenity when we went to visit her in London a couple of weeks ago. And cab rides, in the backseat. The front seat is definitely different.

While we handled most of those rides well, we did not with this one.

As we started around the first few roundabouts (of which they have an excess in this country) we began to feel a bit queasy, as we had two nights before when we had gone to a local pub, just out of walking reach, and had a fairly tasty, yet still disappointing meal. Roundabouts are funny things, if you have never experienced one...they take the place of stop lights...we're guessing.

What a roundabout looks like from the top.
So, how does it work?
Read: Roundabout Basics on Roundabout.net  

As we neared the "big road", following a series of roundabouts, I began to feel as though I might vomit. We, all, are terrified of vomiting...no matter the reason, and being queasy is enough to bring us to tears. We began to shift our feet uncomfortable and moan a bit, James instructed us not the vomit in the foot well. We could feel tears welling in our eyes. Seriously, we are that afraid of vomiting.

We turned off of the main road onto a country road ("dual carriageway") because James wanted to show us the countryside. As the day was turning to dusk we glided around the winding, obscenely narrow, roads of the English countryside. They were just barely wider than an alley, but with lanes in both directions and oncoming vehicles, even buses, approaching from what our brain read as the wrong side. Even at the moderate speed, which tends to be higher than that in America because many of the cars are made to take corners better here, so we're told, James elected to slow down as per our request, if just seemed too much. In any other situation we would have likely enjoyed it, we usually go GoKart racing for our birthday, some of us are a fan of driving fast, and corners; just not at the risk of throwing up.

We made a couple of stops, both on the way to his Nans house, and then on the way to the pub where we were to meet them for drinks after we had our dinner, so that we could get some fresh air, take a breather. It gave us a chance to take a couple beautiful photos though, so it kind of worked out for the best.

England Countryside, March 3, 2012

Winding roads of the England Countryside, March 3, 2012

A church in Suffolk County, England.

On the way home, with our stomach full of food, but not alcohol because we were afraid what that might do to us on the nearly hour car ride home, we discussed with James what might be the cause of our sudden car sickness, as we tried to control our nausea. We are always trying to locate and eliminate issues, whenever possible. Helps us deal with the bigger issues, and also enjoy life when we can. Plus, we have A LOT of driving in our near future where England is concerned. Gotta nip it in the bud.

We have never been car sick, for the most part, though a time or two Catherine (one of our alter persons/personalities) had gotten a little nauseous on short drives around the city where we used to live, when riding with Non-Bestie (TNB), something about the jerking motion of riding in a manual/clutch vehicle. But nothing like this. (The car James recently purchased is a manual)

After some contemplation we figured out what it must be. But how to explain...

Imagine you are about to be in car accident, recall, if you have ever been, how your stomach flip flops and drops. Now imagine that happening over and over as your brain tries to process what it perceives as continuous near accidents.

You see, our brain, our mind, when seeing oncoming traffic in the way we were seeing it, fails to interpret it as normal, so it's telling our body we are about to be in an accident and our stomach responds appropriately...over and over. Gag. Literally pale green.

Our mind in motion. We were in a very bad car accident in the past, and despite it being just over 7 years ago, we had spent several of those years in a state of paralyzed fear, refusing to drive outside of the city at the mere whisper of snow...meaning in the climate where we lived for seven years, there was a huge part of the year we refused to travel. There were two exceptions, which was once for Baby Brother's wedding, and we cried almost the entire 7 hours to the city where he held his nuptials, our of fear; and then again, for Grandpa's funeral a couple of years ago. Other than that our brain was so paralyzed from the trauma TOG (The Other Girl, our former core) never got us out of the city in the winter. And then a few years ago our car stopped working so we never really drove anywhere, preferring to bike and walk.

Flash forward to the acrobats in our stomach this weekend and we concluded that because our brain is freaking out about oncoming traffic, not interpreting it properly, it was making us motion sick. Now we have to work on training our brain that it's okay, by facing our fears (going for car rides and being a front seat passenger as much as we can), and working to rationalize the feeling we are getting, lest we vomit all the way along the 5 hours drive to Cumbria on this coming Friday night. James would not be pleased. Or maybe it's just me, and Catherine and I have a weak stomach when we're in charge.

Other than that our weekend was fairly calm, we just completed what should be the final paperwork on our house sale and sent it to post, hopefully that will be the end of it. We're not sure what we'd do without James, who did most of the work filling out the copious amounts of paperwork, including all the math work required for the revenue agency. Well, we know what we would do, be overwhelmed, panic and mess the whole thing up. If you ever buy foreign property, don't. It's ridiculously difficult for a layman to sell, down the road. What with all the stipulations for non-residents and tax issues...the paperwork was maddening, even for James, and he's a grown up. Ugg, so much work.

Today is Monday, and the weather is proper English wintry and miserable, grey, blustery, rainy, driving us beneath the covers with hopes of writing and art adventures for the day. We popped off to the grocery and plan to make a nice roast chicken for dinner (easy peasy, and that pre-dates Rachael-stupid-Ray). Another week is before us, with a glorious treat at the end, a trip to Cumbria and a visit with our friend Kerry.

So the "More" of this post (yea, you're like, "More?!" and didn't even read this far)...Ivy found a beautiful song we'd like to share, it's actually a song used for a motorcycle awareness and safety campaign in England right now...

Also, we'd like to share two new graphics designed on Sunday.

For the first design 'Jester Elite' we were not without inspiration and so we want to pay thanks to a fellow follower for being our weekend muse.

Follow @RummyLauded - we are a big fan of the tweets from this account.

A little fun.

And then, of course, a little nonsense we like to call 'Pelican Paradise'...even though we're not entirely sure it's a pelican, it's from a photo we took and played around with, we thought it cute, and it appeals to a couple of us. Wooo, children.

As usual our designs are available in our "shop" on CafePress, on loads of products. The graphic design/creative talent that oozes from Cafe Press, in general, is amazing. Any graphic t-shirts we buy from here forward will surly come from that site, there is some pretty unique stuff there. No, we're not an affiliate. We just like to help people find creative endeavors.

Remembering Grandpa

Two days and two years ago, today...at the young age of 79...

We've written about Grandpa in some of our posts this year, and in some of the stories about our life. He truly was an amazing man. Over the past 15 years or so of our life we've found out a lot about our grandparents, and the unconditional love had for each other. It's the kind that makes you believe that, for some people, it exists...or it used to when times we're simpler.

They were honoured as the local Heritage Couple in the community where they lived, and they were just shy of their 60th wedding anniversary...he was father of 7 children, grandfather to 17 and great-grandfather to 6; he buried a son, and a grandson. He was a hunter, a fisherman, a farmer, a gardener (always proud of the huge potatoes, carrots, and produce he grew), a christian family man that worked hard until his last days, when he diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and passed within a month. His passing had a huge impact on our life, and our decision to be open about our mental illness. We never got to say goodbye to him.

Memories of him will never be forgotten by any of us...; he always made a grumpy face when he had his picture taken; he liked to try to scare the grandchildren by pushing his bottom dentures out of his mouth and growling; how when we would kiss him on the check and he would giggle and pretend to be shy; how he would tease us about all of the boyfriends he imaged we had; he was a quiet and serious man, but silly and funny, he loved to play cribbage and socialize...and he sure made the best coffee...

This was the song they played at his funeral accompanied by pictures of him when he was young, as a high school football player, then as a husband and father, and a grandfather, visiting with friends, photos of him with the produce he was so proud of, pictures from hunting camp, and then holding his great-grandchildren in his arms.

He was the kind of man whose love for his wife and his family was the kind everybody should aspire to have, and makes us miss him, today and always.

~Frank et al