Losses

I really want to write something, but I don't know where to start. I am grieving. Last December, I lost our sister Judy. It was expected, because she had been fighting cancer for years. Surgery, radiation, chemo, and some wonderful experimental treatment in Missouri that prolonged her life for years. But it got her. 

      I remember her as a tiny little thing that Mama brought home from the hospital in 1944. She cried a lot. I was four years old, and was learning to tie my shoes. I didn't understand that babies cry a lot. 

      She grew up to be a pretty girl, and right out of high school, married the love of her life, Ron. He was a Forest Service guy, and is a brilliant man, who absolutely adored her. But she's gone, and there is a hole in the heart of Ron, her kids, our mom, my brother, and me. How can you replace someone like that.

       Then, last month, I got a phone call late at night from Mama. I knew that it was bad, because she would never call at that time of night, unless it was. And it was. My oldest daughter, Virginia was in a coma, and not expected to make it. I readied myself for the trip to California, and in the morning, just before I left, I got the message. She was gone.

       I went out anyway. I tried my best to comfort her husband, Pat, my son-in-law. No, my son. He became part of my life, and always will be part of my life as a son. The same for Virginia's former husband, Dann. He is one of my sons too.

       But a light has gone out in my life. My little Grinnie girl is gone. How I loved her. She had a hell of a life. More like a life of hell. Her Daddy, and her mom are both addicts of one kind an another. She was reared by a succession of step dads who did not always treat her well. I don't want to go into that right now, because this is a time for tears, and not a time for getting all pissed off. Besides, those guys are dead. One may still be around, but he's dead to me.

      Virginia loved the sunshine. She loved to play out in the sun. She would spend most of her “Daddy Day” with me when I lived at the beach, picking up sand dollars, pretty shells and pretty rocks. Virginia loved pretty things. 

      And she loved to dance. If we had been rich, and could have afforded dancing lessons, she might have been a ballerina. But she wasn't. She was a beautiful, outgoing woman with an infectious smile that could charm anybody who ever saw it. 

       She loved animals. She got a wild mustang, and tamed it, and gentled it, and rode it all the time.

       There was a down side. Alcohol. I am sorry to say that she inherited the family disease. She fought it, and struggled with it, and, like her dad, it cost her everything dear to her. One of my most cherished memories is being invited to speak at a major 12 step organization convention. (She wrangled it for me. Her and that grin.) My two girls were on the platform with me. Both sober and in their right minds. What a joy that was.

       The bright spot in my story, is the booze didn't get her. An overdose of Tylenol did. Seems it accumulates in the system. Everything is fine until one day you take the recommended dose, and your grandmother calls your dad with bad news.

       I don't know where to go with this. As an inventory step, I know that I am not at fault, but I am still walking around with a hole in me... Two holes. Both of them caused by the loss of two of my most cherished people.

       My life will go on, and I will survive another 24 hours, and another 24 hours until one day I get the chance to see them again. And I will, because I know that they were both committed, born again Christians, and we will meet again in heaven. My soul rejoices in that. But right now, my human is very lonely. 

Agape

Lee