Love, I get so lost sometimes....

It's late on Wednesday; really it's creeping into Thursday morning.....I can't sleep. I know those reading this blog will have a tough time with what I write in this post but I find that writing can be cathartic.

My grandmother died this week. I wasn't prepared. No matter how often I received the calls that she was ill, that she was not getting better, I wasn't prepared. Really though, who prepares for death. We can rationalize that she is in a better place, that her suffering is over; but in reality I'm not ready to say goodbye. Perhaps it is selfish but I wanted more time. More time to send the cards I always meant to send, more time to make the calls that I always promised to make. I want more time with the woman who cared for me in college and who called me by a special nickname no one else was allowed to use. I'll never hear that again. More time with the woman who sang songs when it thundered and who would run her hand down your back in the most comforting way.
It's funny, that house felt more like a home than my own sometimes. It was filled with such love and warmth and laughter. Family filled every room and no one ever rang the doorbell. I'm afraid that this weekend was the last time I slept in "the girls' room." Will this be my last ABA parade to stand on that porch and watch the mummers go by? I'm not sure if I could stomach Ashland with someone else in that house or seeing someone on that front porch. That house holds such memories. That hiding space behind the door, the cups that every grandchild played restaurant with, the plays and padgents we all held....
My grandmother, she was so happy to have her family around her and her family included their friends and the community of Ashland. She was the glue that held us all together. I'm not ready to say goodbye but I did. It was really easy to deny that it happened all weekend while here in Maryland but it's real and I am sad. Very sad. Sad for my self and my sisters but sad for my more sad for my mother and her brothers and sisters. I'm not ready.