It has been 26 days since my Mom's passing, and slowly things are returning to "normal"I can now take a deep breath, and do some of the things that needed done with final paper work, calls, thank-yous. and so on. Amazing how many details remain when someone leaves this earth that must be taken care of because it is the "law"
But what is really weird are the phone calls and cards from distant relatives that you don't even know. Evidently, Mom has a lot of cousins still living in the old home state of Missouri. I have been getting cards from them because they saw the obit. in the Joplin Globe , the local paper in Joplin, Missouri where both of my parents were born and raised.
I have been doing a lot of thinking about my own mortality and what the meaning of life is. One of the things that struck me the most was something that we read in every Obit everyday, and probably don't pay much attention to. " She is survived by"---- and the name and relationships are then listed. Survived by-hm, interesting thought. We who are still living are the survivors, just like the television show. We are the lucky ones, the ones who are still living in a fleshly body, who still walk on the earth, and who go about our menial tasks each day.
Just how did we survive? Was it something that we did special that made us the winners?
Is it just luck of the draw? Several years ago my son and I were talking in a Seattle bar, and we were discussing how all of his grandparents were past the average life expectancy. His maternal grandfather had just passed away a the age of 94. My son said it like this. " It is if all the grandparents names on on a roulette wheel, and god spins the wheel, and the name i lands on is the next to go. I laughed and laughed, because it was a good analogy.
So, I am a survivor this time around, but my name, too, is on that roulette wheel in the sky. How I spend my time is really important, because at any time that wheel may land on my name.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
-
Here is a story that I blogged on in April1,2009. I was looking at it today and decided to repost it. It is always bad to lose contact, an...
-
Here it is, the Grand Theater. It once graced the corner across from Morrow's, which is now, of course, the Brooks Hotel. When I was...
4 comments:
Cedar: Glad you are progessing. Don't think for a moment that I missed your reference to being in the bar and having a profound discussion. Perhaps you discovered the secret to strong and healthy brain cells before I did? HA! Best Regards, your friend, Go Figure.
Thanks, GF. You should have seen what I could come up with I smoked P.O.T. , I spelled it out in case children are listening.(:)
when I was younger!
Glad to hear things are slowly getting back to normal, although, what normal is, who knows....
It was the anniversary of my fathers passing this week and even though it was a few years back with my mother passing just 10 weeks later..... it seems as if it was only last month.....
I never got to go to either funeral, maybe one day I will have that special someone in my life to explain that to.... I have no regrets or baggage over it..... but would dearly love to share it with another so that Im not the only one to know why....
each day the roulette wheel spins....Im waiting for my life to begin even though its near the end LOL
Anyways....... much love to you...
x
Hey, MT. thanks for the kind words. sometimes, it is just too hard ot go to funerals, and everyone mourns in their own way. There is no right and wrong way to mourn and honor our deceased. my wife was very close to her father, and when he passed, she could not bring herself to go to the funeral. it is a personal choice.
Post a Comment