The Luxury of Goodbye

I've been saying for years that I want to live to 100.  I want to get there.  In case you didn't know already, I'm really competitve.

A few weeks ago, my mom told me that my grandpa was sick and would be going into hospice.  He'd reached 90 and his body was failing him.  His giant heart was trying to call it quits, but his difibrillator wouldn't let him.

My sister and I each went out independently to see him, to offer love, to say, "Goodbye Grandpa.  I love you."  We all went out to breakfast.  All the waitresses joked with him.  While I was there, I helped my mom change sheets, do laundry, clean the house, and keep my grandmother, who suffers from dementia, occupied.  We played Rumikub, a family favorite.

Grandpa's legs swelled with edema.  I joked that they looked like tree trunks, and that made him laugh.  I noted the blurry blue tatoos, scars of his service in the Pacific Theater during World War II.  He said simply, "I'm in bad shape."  We all knew it.  I gave him a foot bath and rubbed lotion on his chapped, fluid filled limbs.  He winced if I pressed too hard.  He was miserable.

When we left, I gave him a hug and kiss and said, "I love you Grandpa."  He smiled and continued eating his lunch.  I felt so lucky.

I cried on the way back.  I knew that was my last time seeing him.  It's not quite how I wanted to remember him.  I wanted the energetic, feisty, political guy I've known for 34 years.  I decided that getting to 100 isn't nearly as glamorous as I'd envisioned.  But this is what the end of it is like sometimes.  Slowly, one by one, the organs slow down.  Time and love won't heal them again.

Today, they stopped.  My grandfather passed away this afternoon in his home, and he'd been surrounded by his children only a week before.  Living life was painful, and it's not anymore.  My grandpa, my funny, charming, smart, witty, war-hero, patriotic, loving grandpa, is not of this earth anymore.

He lived a life full of love.