Week 1 - Saying Goodbye
It seems that all too often, I never get the chance to say goodbye to people, and in the case of relatives, when I do make my final goodbye, they are in a condition I would rather not remember.
I do not have any memories of either of my grandfathers (my mother's father died before I was born, and my father's father died shortly after my third birthday), but the final time I saw my grandmothers, they were in very poor health, and seemed to have trouble remembering who I was and what I liked to do. Since I have such good memories of both of them in much better times of their lives, having my final meeting with them, and saying goodbye for the last time, was very painful, even though it needed to be said eventually.
While they may not have been pretty sights, at least I was able to say goodbye to them one last time, unlike some other people in my life.
As some of you know, I volunteer as a delivery driver with Meals For Me. It's inevitable that people will eventually stop getting meals, and therefore leave the route. Take the route which goes through South Brewer, for instance--it was the first route I learned for Meals For Me (during summer 2007), and I eventually had to leave it when classes resumed last fall. When I substituted for the South Brewer route last winter, it was noticeably different from the route I learned in the summer, and now that I recently started doing the route regularly again, it's different (again) from how it was either previous time. As stated earlier, it's not out of the ordinary that routes will change over time, and this I can accept.
What's more difficult for me, however, is when someone leaves a route which on I am an active driver. This has happened a few times, and even if someone is in poor health, it's still sad to see them go, and sadder since I never got the chance to say goodbye. I had gotten fairly close with one of the people on the Old Town route (well, as close as I could get, even watching Food Network with her), making it even worse when she was taken off the route.
One final anecdote about saying goodbye deals with a former teacher who is significantly younger and healthier than those mentioned already.
At one point during my senior year of high school, I learned that Mr. Farrell, who was my math (Calculus BC!) teacher at the time, would be teaching at another school in the fall. On the day of graduation, I made a point to say goodbye to him before I left for home. Unfortunately, I never got the chance, as I never encountered him at the reception, and he left before it was time for me to go. Although it hasn't been a life or death regret for me, I still feel bad about not saying goodbye to him.
I do not have any memories of either of my grandfathers (my mother's father died before I was born, and my father's father died shortly after my third birthday), but the final time I saw my grandmothers, they were in very poor health, and seemed to have trouble remembering who I was and what I liked to do. Since I have such good memories of both of them in much better times of their lives, having my final meeting with them, and saying goodbye for the last time, was very painful, even though it needed to be said eventually.
While they may not have been pretty sights, at least I was able to say goodbye to them one last time, unlike some other people in my life.
As some of you know, I volunteer as a delivery driver with Meals For Me. It's inevitable that people will eventually stop getting meals, and therefore leave the route. Take the route which goes through South Brewer, for instance--it was the first route I learned for Meals For Me (during summer 2007), and I eventually had to leave it when classes resumed last fall. When I substituted for the South Brewer route last winter, it was noticeably different from the route I learned in the summer, and now that I recently started doing the route regularly again, it's different (again) from how it was either previous time. As stated earlier, it's not out of the ordinary that routes will change over time, and this I can accept.
What's more difficult for me, however, is when someone leaves a route which on I am an active driver. This has happened a few times, and even if someone is in poor health, it's still sad to see them go, and sadder since I never got the chance to say goodbye. I had gotten fairly close with one of the people on the Old Town route (well, as close as I could get, even watching Food Network with her), making it even worse when she was taken off the route.
One final anecdote about saying goodbye deals with a former teacher who is significantly younger and healthier than those mentioned already.
At one point during my senior year of high school, I learned that Mr. Farrell, who was my math (Calculus BC!) teacher at the time, would be teaching at another school in the fall. On the day of graduation, I made a point to say goodbye to him before I left for home. Unfortunately, I never got the chance, as I never encountered him at the reception, and he left before it was time for me to go. Although it hasn't been a life or death regret for me, I still feel bad about not saying goodbye to him.