There Are No Words for This

Four days after I got back from helping my oldest sister with Mom’s stuff I got a call from my sister, Judy in California. “Judy”, I said, “it’s great to hear your voice.” We had been talking regularly but Judy often was out of breath or coughing because she was in the hospital fighting pneumonia but this time her voice sounded clear and strong. But she did not have good news. The doctor had just come in and told her they had nothing else they could do for her. “I’m not going to make it,” she said.

So the next day, last Saturday, I left Bud with the dog and the trailer again and flew to Sacramento. I got to spend four wonderful days with my sister, crying and laughing and saying goodbye. It is a tribute to her that the nurses in the ICU unit where she had been did not want her moved to a hospice room. She would make quips and give them heartfelt thank you’s every time they came in to poke or prod her.

She was asleep more than she was awake in the last days, but she always smiled when she woke. And the most frequent words said were “I love you.”

In three weeks I lost my mom and my sister and this loss is huge.

She left me her three beautiful daughters, and though they have thanked me for coming I truly feel I was the one who owed them the thanks.

This is the support crew having a memorial Christmas cookie bake in March, because that was a favorite thing in our family. That’s Jeanie in front, then Scott, Michelle, Luke, Cheryl, Chayse and me.

Lots of laughter, lots of tears.

I am blessed to have a family that in tough times pulls closer and loves harder.

Thank you, Mom; thank you, Judy.