I've experienced two deaths of grandparents in my 29 years: my great-grandmother when I was in high school and my grandpa last autumn. This morning I experienced my third. My grandma succumbed to pneumonia this morning after having battled cancer for the better part of a decade. She had fallen ill after leaving my parents' house when she and my aunt were continuing on to Virginia to see my uncle in Virginia. They were able to make it to Virginia Beach where she was hospitalized and diagnosed. My dad and his twin flew to be by her side when it appeared that she would not be leaving the hospital. A turn for the worse followed by a marked improvement where they projected her being released on Friday, then another turn for the worst. She was given morphine to help her sleep and breathe, one dose. She never woke up. She never struggled again. Surrounded by her children, she knew how loved she was, knew just how much she would be missed. One day short of her 76th birthday, she slipped quietly away. No more pain, no more struggling, she finally got the rest she so desperately wanted in the end. My dad had returned home yesterday and so wasn't able to be with her in her final moments, and honestly, I think that may have been for the best. He'd already seen his wonderful mother slipping away, attached to machines with tubes coming out of her. He didn't need to see her frail body take her last breath.
I've been dealing with my grief for four days now, ever since my dad decided that he needed to fly out to be with her. I knew in my heart that if he was going that it was the end. I came to terms with it in my own way and experienced different levels of the stages of grief, most of those all in a single day. I've been waffling between depression and acceptance today. I'm equal parts devastated and accepting of her passing. I know logically that she's not in pain anymore, but I'm selfishly wishing she was still here. Not sick or in the hospital because that would be beyond selfish, but still alive, still healthy. I take more comfort in knowing she got to meet her two great-granddaughters and see her great-grandson one more time. I also found comfort in cooking today. I made her beans and fried potatoes as well as her fudge.
The famous fudge. For 25 years, I believed it was an old family recipe. She made it for us every time we came to visit, had been making it for her own children and learned the recipe from her mother. She'd written the recipe on a piece of legal paper for my sister when we were in high school. I called her one day to ask her to email the recipe to me. Imagine my shock when she said, "It's on the back of the Hershey's cocoa powder." The shock! The betrayal! The hilarity! I got her back for that one four years ago when I held her hostage and forced her to write the recipe down. I knew one day she'd be gone and that I would want that recipe in her handwriting. It was worth it for the note at the bottom: "Boil again if it doesn't work or eat with a spoon." She had followed that last bit with a story about my Great-Uncle Junior who used to do exactly that any time the fudge didn't set. I'll cherish that story for the rest of my life because I will have that recipe framed and hanging in my kitchen.
I will miss my grandma until I breathe my last breath. And I will think of her every time I see her fudge recipe hanging in my kitchen, every time I have a tuna sandwich, every time I see the first roses bloom in the spring. Every doberman will remind me of her. The smell of pinto beans and fried potatoes will bring back fond memories. Even a line from Shakespeare will make me think of her. She is loved, and she is missed.
"Though she be but little, she is fierce." A Midsummer Night's Dream
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