Goodbyes

A startled feeling as I first see my Grandma. It really does look like she is just asleep.

Closer up, the first thing I notice are her Steelers earrings, placed in holes that I have always thought are low and forward on her longer lobes.

Her face looks as I remember it – nose sharp, cheeks wrinkled, lips that are slightly turned down now that there is no more laughter or smiles to lift them. Her hair white and nicely curled. Her glasses with the diamonds on the sides. Classically beautiful, even in old age.

She wears a floral shirt that has fallish colors – browns and maroons. And lying on her chest is a necklace that says Grandma and has all of her grandkids’ birthstones on it. My aunt says that my grandma must have ordered that necklace herself since no one can remember giving it to her. The green of my peridot makes me tear up, makes me feel that she thought about me, about all of her grandkids, a lot.

She is wearing a Pirates watch. I remember hearing something about the Pittsburgh Pirates just a few weeks ago and thinking instantly of my grandma and the time she was watching a game and said about a player, “That’s my boy.” I don’t even remember who she was talking about, but she told me about him and his career.

The only thing that looks unnatural about her is her hands. The color on them is too smooth, too monotone. Her hands have been dappled for years now, and her fingers would hang at a weird angle when she would clench her hands together. There is also a light, natural polish on her fingernails, but I don’t remember the last time I saw her with polished nails.

Everyone asks my uncle how he is doing. He's the one who spent the most time with my grandma. He's the quietest of her kids. My dad says he's like his dad. 

My dad asks me how his mom looks. I tell him about the hands. He just says that in the last few weeks her hands got really bad, blackened.

I ask him what he thinks, and he says she looks nice, like herself. He said that when his dad died, they made him look about twenty years younger, and it was strange, like he was seeing his dad from years earlier. He said my grandma had been happy about it. She said it made him look like he used to.

I hear him comment to someone else that it just looks like she should take a breath, and it’s true. Watching her lie there, I get the painful feeling in my chest that you get when you watch someone else holding their breath, or staying underwater for too long. A couple of times throughout the evening, the shadows fall across her just right, and I feel a flash of panic as I think for a split second that I see her breathing.

My aunt says that my grandma was afraid to die. Not of what happens after death, but the unknown part of dying. My aunt talked to her about going to see Jesus and said that “perfect love casts out fear.” A few moments later, my grandma took her last few breaths and was gone.

My mom cries when she hugs my grandma’s grandniece, because really, she’s the one who has been taking care of my grandma for years. In fact, a bunch of my grandma’s nieces, nephews, and their children, and even their children show up.

I remind my youngest brother that, even though we don’t know them, we have a vast extended family in this town, and pretty much everyone who comes through is related to us somehow.

My dad introduces us to a cousin of his, and says that he looks like my grandma’s dad. The cousin says that their grandpa used to be the talk of the town for how handsome he was, so he’ll take it as a compliment. My dad tells him that the funeral home director just told him that his grandpa had a girlfriend after his wife died. My dad never knew that before.

I meet another cousin of my dad’s who tells stories about their uncle, how he lost control of a car he was fixing the breaks on and plowed through the yard, over a bunch of newly-planted trees, barely missed the neighbor’s house, and ran into the creek. Later my dad says that that uncle was one of his favorite people, he was quite the character, and he wishes we could have known him.

People call my dad “Sammy,” and it’s strange to hear it.

Others talk about my grandma’s will to live and how tenacious she was, how special she was. My dad says, “She was quite a lady.”

Several people remember Fourth of Julys at her house – which were pretty awesome.

A hospice care worker tells my aunt how nice my grandma was, how she always remembered her name.

 

I hear about the hospice care chaplain, and how my grandma sang with him during the last few weeks.

My dad stands, after everyone has gone, looking down at his mom, hands clenched behind him, silent and still for long minutes.