Life and Death

I look out my window and see so much growing in my garden, my yard. There's blue and pink and yellow and white and orange. Grasses here, trees there, big puffs of smoke on the smoke bush that is taking over, grapes on the vine and currants on the bush. We've had so much moisture that bulbs I planted several years ago are blooming; they have never bloomed before.

As most of you know, I lost my mother and mother-in-law within 2 weeks in May. Since that time a close friend's mother has passed away, the husband of a friend and now today, I learn that my friend Gertrude passed away on Tuesday. As I see all this life, it is hard to comprehend so much death in so short a time. Gertrude especially hurt. I had not been to the nursing home since I got home in mid- June. I told her I would come back and I never did. She was in the hospital for 6 days and I never knew. I feel guilty I didn't make the time to see her. I tried on Friday, but got called away as I was going there. Her son said she didn't know anyone at the end. She always knew me even when she didn't recognize the others. I like to believe she would have known me at the end. I would have liked to hear her say “Hey, kid, come on in” one more time.

She was, as they say, “a spunky old gal”. She was 92 when she died, or 93 or 94 or 95. It depended on the day, the month, the year that you talked to her. She seemed to accumulate years in the last couple so I can't say for sure how old she really was. But up until early this year, she was still living at home, still telling me to plant flowers for her, still drinking instant coffee.

Mom was still trying, even though it was hard and getting harder. We talked about a trip to the redwoods, the one we didn't take last fall as it was on fire (we went to Glacier and Yellowstone instead). I think deep down she knew we couldn't go. Maybe she was just humoring me, making me believe. She was doing good when she came home from the nursing home the first of May; she was gone by the end of it. She never did get to mow her yard again.

Gertrude had been ready to go for a while, but her body kept going. My mom still had plans, but her body didn't want to go on. My mother-in-law hadn't even thought about it yet.

People ask me often why their plants died. Mostly I don't know. What makes one die and the one next to it live? Sometimes it's water, sometimes it's roly polys, sometimes the plant just isn't strong enough. At least plants don't mourn their neighbors. It's a good thing since those of us grieving really need the beauty surrounding us to keep us going some days.