On Oct. 30, it was confirmed that my 91-year-old grandmother had cancer.  On November 1, we met with an oncologist, who told us he thought she had less than a month.  She was suffering with blood clots that were cutting off circulation to her feet, which were turning black and could 'autoamputate.'  Discoloration was moving up her legs.  I wrote about that here.

http://open.salon.com/blog/deliablack/2009/11/02/i_heard_the_news_today_oh_boy

We found out that Medicare is supposed to cover hospice entirely for one month, less so after.  We were able to move Granny to a hospice, which relieved me.

 Grief reminds me of a sea, with small bits  of time borne to the surface to be examined, then released to the cycling waves.

In the beginning, there was Lortab.  Liquid Lortab, because she has always had trouble swallowing.  She only got it when she asked or when someone advocated.  I came to the hospice one day--surely it was mid-day, hours after I had picked up my mother that morning from staying overnight--to find Granny saying, "Oh, my legs.  My legs.  Help.  Help me.  Oh, God, please take me on.  Jesus kill me."  This is a woman who wouldn't even take Tylenol, who pulled herself up from a fall down the back steps at 90, dragged herself inside to the chair in the living room, waited several hours for me to come home from work, then struggled to walk to the car, because she didn't want to have an ambulance bill.  She had fractured her pelvis.

I went to get a nurse.  They gave her Lortab.  She calmed down some.  I would rub her forehead, stroking her silver hair as she slept.  She seemed smaller, only eating a few spoonfuls of broth.

My mother didn't understand.  She packed for my grandmother as if it were a hotel.  Lots of toiletries, powder.  She asked a nurse why they weren't giving my grandma her blood pressure medicine, if her bowels had moved. She tried to get my grandma to eat, though my Granny didn't feel like it. 

My mother is quiet, with shaky hands from years of psychotropic meds, mostly passive.  I remembered when she was in the hospital several years ago after my father's death, not eating.  Granny stood by the bed, leaning over her, almost forcing food down her throat.

"You gotta eat, Mayree!  Eat!  Eat so you can live!"  she'd pleaded, almost frustrated to tears.

I told my mom to only give my grandma food if she asked.  It was just prolonging her suffering.  I noticed a dress hanging on the door.

"Why did you bring her dress?"  I asked my mom.

"In case she has to go to the doctor," she replied.

***

I come again in the middle of another day and know she is in pain. She is weakening . I go to a nurse, forcing politeness.

"You know, she can't push that button to ask for you herself," I said.

"Ok, we know that," the nurse is somewhat condescending. 

I want to yell, "Then why the fuck don't you check on her more often?!?"

She tells me, somewhat slowly, that nurses, "especially hospice nurses" are trained in how to tell if someone is in pain.  That is what they do. 

Luckily, I don't see that nurse again.

***

 If you stand right over Granny and speak up, she can only nod or shake her head, as I had tried to explain to an uncle who earlier stood over her asking, "Where does it hurt?", as if she could still articulate.  I had quit looking at her feet, because I thought I detected a wince when I moved the pads they'd loosely wrapped around them.  One night, she'd asked me to rub her feet and legs to help her.  This is right after she'd had pain medicine, and I didn't know if they would give her  more.  Her legs were almost swollen to bursting, like pink sausages, with the discoloration coming on about calf-high and ending in black toes.  I had rubbed her once-twiggy legs, praying, asking her if it helped.  She said it did, but I could tell it wasn't enough.  Finally, I decided to see if they would give her more pain medicine. 

I got a nurse.  This one has close-cropped hair.  Seems very professional, but kind.  She gave Granny more medicine.

***

Granny can almost not swallow the Lortab.  It is a struggle to get it down.

The close-cropped hair nurse, who I later learn is Bitsy, says she will call the doctor to get Granny on morphine.

The next time I see her, she is receiving shots through an attachment to her hand.

On one of my hands, I hate to ready for a memorial service, because that is like wishing her away.  On the other, I'd rather be busy and ready.  Without telling her (she does know it is the end....I made sure), I write her obituary.

One uncle, the only son-in-law, tells me over the phone that he thought "we'd" just go with the two-line free announcement of her death that comes automatically in the paper.  She doesn't have any friends left to read the obituary, he says.  "She don't need that shit!" he raises his voice at me over the phone, though I haven't raised mine.

I call my Granny's *actual* children, who overrule him.  I wonder why we need even that amount of drama now.

***

Granny has made it clear, when still strong enough to talk, that she wants to die, but the only way to allow assisted suicide in Mississippi is to let someone hunt with Dick Cheney.

I go to see her in the middle of the day to assess her pain as best I can (though I lack the training of a nurse).  I hold her hand and pray that God will let her go.  I'll admit, I am too tired for an extremely fervent prayer.  I substitute diligence.  Sometimes it seems the light swells and that the room is tingly. I feel something in the air, a light that goes beyond the five senses. I find that I am listening to her unsteady breaths, and when there is a space between them longer than expected, I get hopeful, then defeated as the next one comes.  I try to tell God that I will let him work.  Vaguely, I wonder if my religious upbringing is correct.  Should I get her attention and really be sure she's accepted Jesus?  Could I be wishing her to a hell I'm not sure I believe in if she dies like this?  She had told a relative recently that she wasn't sure she would see her dead relatives again.

I think of what I have felt-- not heard-- about God, and this brings relief.  I pray for her, for all of us, the peace that passeth all understanding.

The breaths keep coming.  I just ask God that if I can't be with her when she goes, he will be, someone will be.  I still hurt when I think of my dad dying alone.  I try to tell myself that maybe in some way, he wasn't.

***

I come back another day.  Bitsy had told us the day before that she doesn't think Granny will last the day.  Today she says that it is only hour to hour.  I sit again, after determining to the best of my ability that she isn't in pain (though I lack the training of a nurse).  Her eyes are barely opened.  She can only nod and is eating nothing. 

"Whenever you feel like you need to go," I raise my voice slightly, leaning down to her, "you go.  You will see them again.  You will see your family.  We love you."

Her mouth is always opened.  Even when she can't eat, she wants water.  Now, since she can't swallow, I drip water from a straw into her dry, tiny mouth.  Her skin is yellowish.  There are tiny half moons that remind me of horizons between the pink bands on her eyelids.  She has shrunken even more.

I pray again.  Rest.  Try to think.  Try to hope that she is peaceful and knows she isn't alone.  I stroke her silver hair almost every time I see her.  It used to be black, even darker than mine, I heard.  I sign out before I leave, realizing I have been there over an hour again.

I come Friday morning to pick up my mother from staying overnight.  Granny seems to be sleeping.  I mention the obituary in front of her in conversation with my mom, then apologize, though she seems to have heard none of it.  She is locked away in her world for now, I guess.

Almost two hours later, my aunt calls.  Bitsy had called her and said that Granny died.

They will not move the body yet if we call and say we want to see her.

My mother, brother, and I go.  She is covered, still lying in the room.  Her mouth is still open.  I can't close it, but I close her eyes.  I tell my brother that I heard they put coins on Lincoln's eyes, as was the custom back then.  I think they have to make small incisions now to shut them, don't they? 

Her body still has some warmth, though a chill has settled in.  Her complexion is a dull yellow.  I stroke her hair again.  It almost feels as if she is alive.  I try not to choke up.

I go outside.  It is a clear, cool day.  Beautiful really.  Tropical Storm Ida has long passed.  I wonder where she is.

***

We make plans with a funeral home, the cheapest we could find. It is a simple building next to a trailer made to look like a house.  She wanted to be cremated.  They will bury the ashes, so we don't have to sneak them in, as she supposed.

At the funeral home, I see tiny replicas next to the larger urns.

"Are those to keep portions of the ashes?" I ask.

The funeral director says yes.  I ask to see what Granny's ashes will be buried in.  He shows me a black box, plastic, that he and the son-in-law previously agreed on.  I think, "Her ashes could survive a plane crash."

The funeral director asks if we want to keep portions of the ashes.  The son-in-law asks my mother and aunt.  He does not look at me.  I don't want to seem weird.  I would probably spill them anyway.

***

I work on the shit obituary that she doesn't need.  (The son-in-law, to his credit, has come around).  I debate how to say that she worked 'outside the home' only once in her life.  I debate how to make it clear that she was fiery, without showing the bitterness or how hard to get along with she could be.  I come up with this:

Besides working in a tool room in a South Carolina shipyard during World War II, Mrs. ______ stayed home to raise her family.  "Granny," as she was called, could be fiercely protective of her brood, but she also had a gentle side.  When her son recently asked what gave her the most joy in life, she replied, "You babies."

I hate form obituaries.  I want this to stand out, in a good way.  I debate mentioning the time she banged a bully's head against the wall because he'd picked on one of my uncles.  The bully's mom had come down to the house, screaming that she would "break this door down!"  (Even in times when others didn't, Granny was paranoid enough to lock her door during the day.)

"You just try!" Granny said from the other side of the door, where she stood calmly ironing.

I leave that part out.

***

I am finally able to finalize a memorial service with a church, so I email the obituary.  I call the funeral director to make sure he's gotten it. It is either now or another phone call--I think another phone call--where I hesitate.

"Yes?" he says.

"I---" I am too embarrassed.  "It's nothing.  I'll go."

"No, Ms. Black..."

"It's not important." struggle, keep voice steady

"Why don't you tell me what it is you want?" he is a bit annoyed.  I feel my face contort.  I force words from a deep place I wish to hide.

"Would it be all right if you give me...a lock of her hair before you [burn her up] cre-cremate her?"

His tone changes.  He says that will be fine. 

***

My mother, retired, enfeebled from a heart attack and huge battles with bipolar disorder, seems to be taking it well.  My brother seems OK.  One uncle, the first of her sons, the one she defended with a head banging, is suffering.

An aunt called me a few days before Granny died and, in retrospect, seemed to be about to cry, but I was so busy quieting my fighting dogs that I was too pissed to notice at the time.

My mother plays the classic country music station on TV.  It grinds away, annoying me.  Merle Haggard comes on.  Though I like some of his music, one should not have to listen to Merle Haggard when already grieving.

"Silver wings..." he tells me.  "Shining in the sun--light."

"Roaring engines," he goes on.  "Headed somewhere in flight."

"They're taking you way, ay," he insists. "Leaving me lone-ly."

"Silver wings....slowly fading out of sight."

Then it gets worse.

"'Don't leave me,' I cry. 'Don't take that air-a-plane ride.'

But you locked me out of your mind.  Left me standing here behind."

I think of hair I will never touch again.  I think of others  I have lost and those I will lose.  I wish I'd kissed my father the last time I left him sleeping.  I don't think I kissed my grandmother that last day.

I weep.  Sitting on the couch donated to Granny after Katrina ("Oh, I don't like black," she'd told us), I weep. I am tired.  I am in pain.

At least, this is what I think. 

(I lack the training of a nurse.)