Grieving

Gracie and I are still in Lynchburg, and will likely be for the remainder of the week.

Garren returned to Strasburg Sunday night, Gracie and I decided to stay another day so we could visit with my dearest Aunt Lou. It seems like whenever I visit Lynchburg, I never have enough time to visit with her. I told her so Sunday afternoon when I drove her home from church. I also told her that I wanted to see her Monday so we could catch up. Unfortunately I was too late. I stood outside her home for an hour as I prayed that she would soon hear me and open the door. The doctors said she had passed away about two hours before I got there.

Though I am greiving, I take solice that she passed while napping on the couch, and waiting for me to come and see her.

I am her baby. She has called me that for as long as I can remember. She has no children of her own, but I might as well be one. I spent most of my childhood in her home and in her life. We went to church together nearly every Sunday after a weekend at her house. We baked together, and played and shopped. She is primarily responsible for the woman I am today, and I certainly hope she knew that. She taught me how to be caring to others, to be a lady, to sew and bake, and to me a mother. She gave me the foundation for my faith in God, and in myself. When no one else was listening, I knew she was. She understood me, the same way I understood her.

I guess you could equate her to a Grandma, but she was more than that. It was more than the recipes and the scraps of material to make a baby doll dress. It was the lessons and beliefs that she handed down. The same ones I will pass on to Gracie.

She never missed a birthday or Christmas with me. She was there when I was confirmed, when I graduated high school and college, when I got married, and when I gave birth to Gracie. She sent me notes and cards out of the blue, just to tell me she was thinking of me and what she had done that day. I am not sure how to live without her in my life.

I have my memories, and I am very thankful that God let me, and the rest of us have her for as long as he did. I am thankful that Gracie got to know and love her, and that she will continue to know her through pictures and movies and stories.

I know that the pain will lessen as time goes on, but it is very hard right now to remember that. There are so many others in this house right now dealing with her absence, and I feel compelled to keep my grief hidden. And that is making it harder I know.

I went to her home today. I remembered all the things I used to do with her. I found my secret hiding spots, and I watched my daughter play as I did with one of the doll houses...and my heart broke. I saw her clothes over the bed, the kissing angels on the mantel we found together at a yard sale for 50 cents, and I heard Gracie run down the hallway just like I did...and I wanted to cry. I smelled her house and I ran my fingers over her neatly tucked bedspread...and the pain was overwhelming.

I don't think anyone will ever know how much she ment to me. I was just a child, and I am only her neice. No one knows my pain. I am the one she called "baby."

Wait, there is one person who knows my pain...when no one else understood me or wanted to listen--she did. And she is likely in heaven now listening to me weep and praying for me as she has for the past 27 years.

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