How to get through the passings of people you really didn't know when you have way more important stuff to do

For the record: Yes, it is quite possible that I am a big fat hypocrite because I know I wasn't anywhere in sight. Your mother can explain it better than I can.

Dear My Best Friend's Beautiful and Busy Children (even Nathaniel),

I know that I lack the integrity of someone who actually came to the funeral (see your mom about this--I have a note), but a polite person will always send a gift in their absence and this is that gift for you--these thoughts that most people don't get until it is too late. There will come a time when it is too late (we all get at least one) and you will know immediately that of which I write.

I knew your grandmother for a million years. She welcomed me into her home when my own became too much to bear. She was benign with her criticisms (and they could have been legion--again, ask your mom) but she simply let me have a place to be. A huge gift to a difficult kid who was in way over her (my) head in about 400 parts of her silly (more than most) little teen-aged life. She took me to the beach and let me and your mom just be who we were. I would not, have not seen that again in my almost 42 years (note: your mother will always be older than I, just for the record you should always know that). Thank you Miss Ceta.

You were, for the most part, not around your grandmother. I do understand that you didn't know her very well until she was more of an intrusion and a bed-taker than a beloved guest. I understand that she was a huge weight on your parents' shoulders and that it is a relief that she has passed. All that is to be expected and not held against anyone at all.

BUT.

I want you to understand that no matter the condition in which you met her or saw her last, she was much, much more than that physical and mental limitation. You will never know her as she was, but I would ask you to trust those who did when they tell you how colorful and funny and loving your grandmother was. How she smoked like a chimney (a very busy downtown chimney with a 24hr furnace) until Brittany got sick. Then there occurred in the town of Essex, a flat-out You-Can-Call-Me-Jesus-And-Hang-On-While-I-Calm-This-Here-Storm-for-You-Miracle. She worked it out w/God that if she quit smoking, Brit would recover. Sweet, yes? Brittany, you're lovely and smart and everything in your path sparkles with promise, but Baby, you have got to know your grandmother LOVED her some smoking. Loved it. But she loved you more.

I realize that your visits to her house were not entirely pleasant or comfortable as you might recall. The human condition sucks as we age. Her house was smaller than you needed and perhaps dirtier than you liked, but she offered it to you on a (okay, not so clean) platter. Just like she did to me. Remember that. Even as she was unable to provide fabulous housing for you, she offered what she had with a glad heart. It's rather like what we have to offer God. Not so much, but with a glad heart. And God, who shows us how to be, accepts our grubby offerings with a glad heart and without critical words.
Your grandmother did not come to a gentle end, despite the efforts her children made. She was absolutely as comfortable and cared for as circumstances permitted. But you must know that her children would have done anything to give her more. It's like that sometimes. As much as we can, it is not enough. Human Condition sucks.

Perhaps she was not the person you would have chosen as your grandmother. Perhaps. But she was the person God chose for the job. Now, Granted, He rarely calls me into into His Office (okay, He never does, no matter how smart I think I am and how many degrees I have but whatever), but He's really quite savvy about such things. So know that and think on it, even if you don't accept it. God doesn't mind if we roll things around in our silly heads like tennis balls in a dryer for a bit.

Ohh, how she loved every last lovely one of you. Oh My Gosh. You all were beyond her wildest dreams and hopes. You amazed her. That sort of thing may or may not happen again-- Amazement is hard to come by, so hold it tightly, treasure it in from your grandmother. Aside from that, she taught your mother how to love. And your mother loves y'all pretty darn good. I adore my kids, but I think you'd all end up huddled in my carport under an old blue tarp if you were here more than a day or two. By your own choice. And you'd really be pissed if nobody under the tarp had a cell phone. I'm just saying. You were five golden points on a glorious, brilliant star for your grandmother. And where she fell short for your mom (as moms always do) that's where your mom learned to do better. And your mom is good. No really.

The other thing is that your mama's losing her mama. This is certainly not the least of the hard stuff here, but I would ask that you please, please be gentle on your mama because this whole MLM (mama losing mama) is horrifying and frightening and cold, no matter what kind of mama a mama might lose. Even if you don't realize it, it puts you a tiny bit closer to the head of the line in terms of this mortal coil. No matter what you believe comes thereafter, when your own mama passes, there's a draft whisping around the corners of your life and it whispers, "swifter...sooner....sadder." I could improve that image, but you know how it is. Might come back to it.

Your mother needs you to know that she is grieving for someone you might not have known so well, or liked so much and that This doesn't matter one teeny weeny micro-atom sized bit for you. Read that last sentence again. Outloud. You are called to pray and grieve for and with your mother because she is your mother. There's no homework pass for that. I think maybe there's even a commandment about it, but as your mother and father can tell you, my theology is not especially similar to your own, even as much as I respect your beliefs. I know that if you respect life, so then you must grieve for the loss of it, especially, especially if it is a life on which your own has been built. Please, my best friend's beautiful children (even Nathaniel), I want so badly for you to learn this now instead the dreaded "too late." Too late will show up, and dag, you think THIS is a pain in the buttocks, oh, you have no idea the pain of too late. BTDT.

In these times, as hard as it is, just as you are finding out who you are, please try to put that aside for a speck of time. You will be you for a really long time(I think that's true even in Star Trek episodes) and the funny part is that you never will figure out most of it and if you do, you will be completely bored by it. So take a break, and for right now, for just this minute, and simply be your mother's children. Be that. Be also your grandmother's beautiful, glorious, blinding star. Always, always you should and will be that, even when you go back to being you. But especially now, remember the women who love you most and offer up yourself up to them for this brief time. Be the child and the grandchild. It matters. They will be impressed, and you will learn from it. And, best friends beautiful children (even Nathaniel), the lesson and the learning is the thing. (Also, it's all I have in my bag of tricks, since this old teacher couldn't even manage to get her sorry self to Maryland to say it in person.)

I adore you, every one, even Nathaniel, and I am sorry that I don't see you very often because you really are a great pleasure. Now, if that's how I feel, all down in Alabama with the fire ants and all, then consider how much more your grandmother felt. Just consider it. Getting through the passing is pretty quick--two viewings and a funeral, maybe a trip to the cemetery. Learning from it is the hard part.

So, my best friend's beautiful children (even Nathaniel), it won't cost you anything to read this or think on it. Won't cost you to pray on it. Really, it won't cost you to do it, but that's your own business. You will be busy for your whole lives. Pause just for now and think of what might look good to God. And your Mom.

Okay. You can crumble it up now. And Nathaniel, I'm just messing with you.

Sorta.