It Happens

All  lives come to an end.  It happens.  At my age, 67 sliding rapidly to 68, it seems life can be a real roller coaster.  With 3 sisters and their extended families, my husband's extended family, friends and even casual acquaintances, life is in constant flux.  In the last two weeks one sister has had her husband in the hospital with a mild heart attack.  He had a splint placed in a vein, was released from the hospital and is doing fine.  Two days after the release, their daughter gave birth to a healthy baby boy.  The next morning Sister's closest friend's mother passed away.

Earlier this week Sister's oldest son spent the day in the ER with migraines, loss of vision in one eye and elevated blood pressure.  Last night Sister took our Mom to sit with our aunt as she lay slipping from this life.  This morning Sister and Oldest Sister had to go tell our Mom her youngest sister was gone.  The last of our Mom's siblings.

Husband and I did our morning walk on Friday and used the walk to do several errands in the nearby shopping area.  One of the errands was our breakfast.  Husband always greets the manager who opened the restaurant only a month after we moved here.  Not seeing the young- to -us -manager, he asked for him. The forty something Jeff had died in his sleep a couple of months earlier.  The new manager came to speak to Husband.  It happens.

My Aunt Opal always called me her first baby.  She was 21 when I was born.  She turned 89 this last April.  A good, long life filled with her family of two daughters, grandchildren and great grandchildren.  Before she married she spent her weekends off at our home.  She even had her own bedroom at our house.  She bought me my only tricycle, over 100 golden books, clothing, shoes, hats and gloves.  She paid for the gasoline for all of us to go on two vacations.  She and I rode together in the back seat of that old, blue Chevy.  The last time she came to visit me in Missouri, she brought me a Golden Book.  Always giving, always loving.

It seemed the first few family members I lost there was such a sadness.  Now we are down to so few of my Husband's and my parents' generation left, the loss of each one leaves a huge, gaping hole.  A hole that we try to fill with memories both new and old.  Tonight I will go watch my oldest grandson play 7th grade football.  I will all the while be, also, carrying on the legacy of love of my oh so precious Aunt Opal.