Thanksgiving 2015
With everything going on, the holiday in some ways felt like an obligation--like something we *had* to do. We'd already bought the food, the turkey was thawing in the fridge, we have to cook it anyway. Mom's been pretty stressed, neither of us has slept all that well. Still, grandma called about 9 this morning, and we told her we were planning to eat at 1 but she could come whenever. Therefore, we had no idea when she'd show up. I was up on the computer about noonish, and mom was getting ready after her shower. I thought dad was up there too, so I ran to get the door; turns out he was in the basement, hadn't showered, wasn't ready at all, and he snuck upstairs while grandma and I were talking. She had given me this big basket of stuff for my birthday and I was looking through it.
When mom came down, she started showing grandma two of the albums we're bringing; one is an album I put together of their wedding pictures, and the other is the album I found at my grandfather's, the one he put together that is all sorts of pictures and letters jumbled together in no particular order. With them out of the way, dad and I were able to finish cooking without much hassle, which was nice; mom even commented on it. It wasn't until I was finishing up with the stuffing, which I made fancy this year--adding the celery, onion, apple, and walnuts recommended by the recipe, instead of just water, butter, and stuffing cubes--that mom lost it. She'd been talking normally and had been talking about the last time she spoke to her dad. My back was to everyone, toasting the walnuts; she said something like, the last thing I said--and then there was this pause. Dad had gone, the last thing you said was... And then we realized she was crying. This is the first time I've seen her break down. That caused me to start--I can be a total sympathy crier--and she went upstairs for a few minutes. It turned out that what she said was, bye, dad, sweet dreams. That was a really nice thing to say.
We were okay the rest of the time, mainly talking about him but also talking about family and what we were planning to do on Sunday. Mom wanted me to read what I was going to say, as I plan on speaking. Yeah...not done yet. I've been composing it in my head for days, but I shouldn't make it too long, and I don't want to say anything too embarrassing, yet I want to capture his essence. He...was special, that's for sure.
Grandma left about 3:30, quarter to four, and we were all tired after that. Granted, and we mentioned this, my grandfather's death is a big relief to the family. We've been dealing with this for four and a half years. It hasn't really hit mom yet, and we think it won't until after Sunday. However, we're so screwed up that we barely know what day it is. It doesn't feel like a Thursday, and grandma kept saying stuff like, you'll feel better after tomorrow, thinking we were having the memorial tomorrow. No, we have a few more days. I'm actually glad, because there's still a lot of work to do for it. But, yeah, we'll be glad when it's through.
When mom came down, she started showing grandma two of the albums we're bringing; one is an album I put together of their wedding pictures, and the other is the album I found at my grandfather's, the one he put together that is all sorts of pictures and letters jumbled together in no particular order. With them out of the way, dad and I were able to finish cooking without much hassle, which was nice; mom even commented on it. It wasn't until I was finishing up with the stuffing, which I made fancy this year--adding the celery, onion, apple, and walnuts recommended by the recipe, instead of just water, butter, and stuffing cubes--that mom lost it. She'd been talking normally and had been talking about the last time she spoke to her dad. My back was to everyone, toasting the walnuts; she said something like, the last thing I said--and then there was this pause. Dad had gone, the last thing you said was... And then we realized she was crying. This is the first time I've seen her break down. That caused me to start--I can be a total sympathy crier--and she went upstairs for a few minutes. It turned out that what she said was, bye, dad, sweet dreams. That was a really nice thing to say.
We were okay the rest of the time, mainly talking about him but also talking about family and what we were planning to do on Sunday. Mom wanted me to read what I was going to say, as I plan on speaking. Yeah...not done yet. I've been composing it in my head for days, but I shouldn't make it too long, and I don't want to say anything too embarrassing, yet I want to capture his essence. He...was special, that's for sure.
Grandma left about 3:30, quarter to four, and we were all tired after that. Granted, and we mentioned this, my grandfather's death is a big relief to the family. We've been dealing with this for four and a half years. It hasn't really hit mom yet, and we think it won't until after Sunday. However, we're so screwed up that we barely know what day it is. It doesn't feel like a Thursday, and grandma kept saying stuff like, you'll feel better after tomorrow, thinking we were having the memorial tomorrow. No, we have a few more days. I'm actually glad, because there's still a lot of work to do for it. But, yeah, we'll be glad when it's through.