Coming to Terms: My Grandmother’s Sister

Sometimes death is a relief. Your 95-year-old great grandma who has suffered severely from memory loss for the last ten years and hasn’t been able to take care of herself for five is sad, sure, but a relief.
More often than sometimes, though, death is tragic, unexpected and happens too soon. Tornadoes, cyclones and earthquakes are killing random masses of people. Trains have taken more than one life in the last two years.A Fargo widower and parent of two would be celebrating his anniversary this month if his partner hadn’t died giving birth last year.

I was blessed (or cursed, depending on how you look at it) to be born into a “dying” family. My first viewing? Five years old. My sister was two. Great Grandpa Lottie died of liver problems after too many years of drinking at “The E” and my mom brought us to say goodbye. Grandpa’s hands were crossed over his chest and wrapped in a rosary.

And then Great Grandpa Karl. Great Grandma Doreen with the colostomy bag and the imaginary crochet needles. Kids my age. Ben died of an asthma attack caused by an open window when they sprayed for mosquitoes. Chris took his own life. Kelly died after a small heart murmur mixed with anesthesia put her into a coma.

Great aunts and uncles have died one after the other fairly consecutively since my Great Grandpa passed in 2001, the year I graduated from high school.

I’m nearly certain my family in one way or another paid for the leather couches in the lobby at Korsmo. The director recognized my sister and I when we walked in last month. When people my age say they haven’t been to a funeral I’m surprised. Death is not something new to me, why then, when my aunt died of cancer last month, was I so screwed up about it?

She died of liver cancer at 71. Grandma told me over winter break that her sister was dying, and that she’d saved my letters. You know, the real pretentious “this is what I’ve been up to” letters. They aren’t so bad when you have a family or live away from other family members. However, they are a bit egotistical when it’s just you and your indoor plants in the town where nearly all your family still lives.

My aunt requested that I read at the prayer service and I freaked.

This time it wasn’t so easy. It struck me that the death of a family member isn’t a joyous event; that the passing of someone you know is a time you question your own mortality.

I was crying in the bathroom at work. I walked from Moorhead to Downtown Fargo even after being offered a ride. I drank alone. I wrote an intense, illogical email to a new friend at 2 a.m. that surely forced him to question my sanity. And I had to work at 6:30.

The following day I realized the selfishness of my grief, the guilt of not taking the time to care for, say good bye to, or get to know a woman who clearly appreciated me.

You always think that you have more time, and many of us do. We all have lots of time. Many years to form the relationships that matter most, care for the people who care for us, listen to one another.
But I kind of think that’s all bullshit. What we actually have is right now. A moment in the present to either care for someone or not, and when it is our time, will we remember the promotions or the bonuses? Probably not. We’ll probably think of the people. Those present and those passed. The amazing moments and missed opportunities. (Think of the last scene in “American Beauty”). Either way, we’ll be thinking of the relationships we had with those we loved.
I don’t mean to preach. I’m sure I haven’t made the extra effort to show anyone that I care, but I did lose my cool at work, I did unload on a friend, and I did need a walk and a beer to calm down.
I’m still thinking about it.