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Jul. 30th, 2006 03:39 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alonewiththemoonMy 93-year-old grandmother had a massive brain hemorrage yesterday morning. Right now she's on a ventilator and a IV drip, but the doctors say really she's already gone. My dad has gone down to Scranton with a copy of her living will and his power of attorney and most likely terminating life support.
Obviously I am sad, but she was (is? we don't have a tense for this) able to live life on her own terms until the end. The only things that she really feared were having to move to an assisted living facility, losing her driver's license, or succumbing to dementia. She lived in her own apartment, recently re-passed the driver's exam and was sharp as a tack. She had just come back from a trip to Florida, where she was the able-bodied escort for a friend of hers some 15 or 20 years her junior. Nothing slowed her down, despite having both hips replaced and a bout with breast cancer that resulted in a double mastectomy. At 89 she took up hula dancing so that she and her friends could do a funny skit at church. She is truly an inspirational woman.
Her husband, my grandfather, died when my father was in high school, and being a devout Baptist she has been waiting to be reunited with him. If she was aware at all in the moment that the hemorrage happened, I would like to think that she was thinking of seeing him soon.
I dreamed earlier this week that she and I were shopping in downtown Boston and agreeing what a good thing it was that Filene's Basement wasn't affected by the closing of Filene's. She and I definitely both share the "shopping is fun" gene, both always on the hunt for a bargain. There's a lot of stuff I don't believe in, but maybe it was somehow a way of saying goodbye. I can see it that way without necessarily believing it.
Obviously I am sad, but she was (is? we don't have a tense for this) able to live life on her own terms until the end. The only things that she really feared were having to move to an assisted living facility, losing her driver's license, or succumbing to dementia. She lived in her own apartment, recently re-passed the driver's exam and was sharp as a tack. She had just come back from a trip to Florida, where she was the able-bodied escort for a friend of hers some 15 or 20 years her junior. Nothing slowed her down, despite having both hips replaced and a bout with breast cancer that resulted in a double mastectomy. At 89 she took up hula dancing so that she and her friends could do a funny skit at church. She is truly an inspirational woman.
Her husband, my grandfather, died when my father was in high school, and being a devout Baptist she has been waiting to be reunited with him. If she was aware at all in the moment that the hemorrage happened, I would like to think that she was thinking of seeing him soon.
I dreamed earlier this week that she and I were shopping in downtown Boston and agreeing what a good thing it was that Filene's Basement wasn't affected by the closing of Filene's. She and I definitely both share the "shopping is fun" gene, both always on the hunt for a bargain. There's a lot of stuff I don't believe in, but maybe it was somehow a way of saying goodbye. I can see it that way without necessarily believing it.
