…I will not be myself. I got word last night that my grandmother isn’t doing well.
My mother sent me a text. Upon first receiving and reading the contents, I was appalled. What nerve she has, telling me something so magnanimous in a text message. I had to have some stress relief. I went to smoke hookah with a friend. The world disappeared for those two hours.
I got back to the apartment and went to sleep. I had a headache and was going on little sleep anyway. I didn’t do my homework. I didn’t care. I wanted the world to stop spinning. I wanted to cease to be.
I woke up this morning and went to school. Two classes. I received and missed a call from my sister. Voice mail. She wanted to know if I was going to make it back to Arkansas for the Labor Day Weekend. I have work. We started talking about my previous night with my mother. My sister had also spoken with her.
Things are bad. My grandmother hasn’t eaten in days. She is starting to mottle. (For those who don’t know what that is, it is when blood stops circulating. Starts in the lower extremities and works its way up.) Her end is near. I know now why my mother didn’t call to tell me. She’s been crying. According to my sister, she hasn’t been at work either. Things are falling apart without my grandmother to hold them together.
I have tried to figure out why she’s holding on. I have racked my brain with different reasons as to why she would remain in such a lifeless life…and I come up with nothing. I know she cares about us. I know she realizes we’ll hurt when she’s gone. I know she knows we love her. But we don’t want her to be in pain. No one here would ask her to stay in this pain, both physically and emotionally, to be near us when we make it back to her room.
All that said, I’ve lost the person I would go to about this. I have no one to turn to anymore for comfort. I’ve never been able to go to someone and be able to just cry. I’ve been the strong one. People called me to ask them for comfort, a shoulder to cry on, a friend. I finally found someone that could be that for me…and they aren’t here anymore. I feel so lost without them.
