Coming and Going

Since coming home to the US from India, we were able to spend a very special five weeks with my Grandma Jean at her home in Boulder, Colorado.  She was waiting in the driveway when we drove in and had our room decorated with balloons for Samantha and chocolate bars on our pillows for me.  Throughout our weeks together, we slipped into the routine we'd established ten months prior when we moved in for a month after her husband of 67 years, Grandpa Sam, passed at home.

Samantha and I spent most of our days with Grandma Jean, eating in the kitchen or out on the deck and running errands as needed.  Grandma liked to spend a lot more time at home these days, and was content to watch Samantha play with the dishwasher or move chairs in the kitchen like they were a walker!  At cooler times of the day, we'd walk around the block; it gave her such delight to introduce Samantha Jean to neighbors and old friends along the route.  There was always a little tear that slipped out when she said that, as Grandpa Sam's death was still so fresh and perhaps the tribute so great. 

When we did have to get out and into the car for one of Grandma's doctor appointments, it was an adventure.  As many of you may know, time spent in the car isn't Samantha's favorite past time, mostly because she's just been reintroduced to the car seat after nine months in India with no restraining device (that's right, no car seat, high chair or stroller).  When we'd need to go out, Grandma would say something sarcastic like, "does Samantha get to come?  Oh joy, this is going to be fun!"  And usually for the next many minutes in the car, Samantha would tell us just how much she didn't appreciate the safety trappings of the USA.

In the afternoons after Grandma, Samantha and I had all taken our naps and eaten lunch together, we'd hang out some more, talking/playing/reading out loud until Andy was home from work and he'd begin making us dinner.  He and Grandma would usually enjoy a long chat over these preparations, sometimes Grandma would drink a cocktail with him and most days not, as her taste buds were changing to dislike the taste of alcohol for the first time.  She and Andy had a great banter; she loved talking about his recently sculpted, "girly figure" since returning home from India.  Even at 92, how one looked mattered.

On the Saturday before she passed, we all spent the day together.  The night prior we'd had a bunch of the nieces and nephews over for a pool/slumber party.  The pool party continued into Saturday AM and then the house fell quiet again, just back to what Grandma called "the little family" which meant Andy, Samantha, me and Grandma.  Due to the extreme heat, we suggested she come and stay downstairs in the basement with us and we all read down there.  Throughout the afternoon spent in the cool basement, we read New Yorker article after article and even played a few songs on my phone for Grandma to hear some of the latest Indie music detailed in one of our articles.  Andy and I traded off while one of us would engage Samantha at the many basement bookshelves.  Samantha's favorite pastime was to take all of the books off the shelves.  While Grandma couldn't see Samantha, she could hear her and laughed as she heard me putting all of the books back on the shelves throughout the day.  

Around seven in the evening, Grandma decided that she had had enough reading and that before dinner we should head out on our usual neighborhood walk together.  As I walked into the garage to get the stroller with Samantha, Grandma began walking up the stairs to get ready.  She made it to the top of the stairs and then fell all the way down.  It was the most horrible vision I've ever seen and heard, witnessing Grandma tumble down those stairs.  Andy carefully lifted her out of the door jam and cradled her while the ambulance and fire department arrived.  When she came to, what pained me the most was knowing that she knew this wasn't the end but instead what she knew would be a painful recovery.  In that moment, I think Grandma knew that the fall was in someway the end, and as one of my cousin's said later, it also gave Grandma the permission to die.

Bruised and battered with stitches in her head but with nothing broken, we carried Grandma back into her home the next morning.  Throughout the next day I felt how weak and tired she was.  It wasn't until one of my cousins came and saw Grandma the next day that we all realized what had been in front of us.  Grandma said she was "tired of suffering" and that she was "ready to go."  She didn't want to return to the hospital, as I believed she would need to, she wanted to die after a long, full life.  In that moment, I really thank my cousin for saying what needed to be said, "We need to call hospice."  I just wasn't there yet, but I was so thankful for her to voice what needed to be said.  In those next frantic moments, Andy went in to Grandma's room and asked her what she wanted definitively and this is indeed what she wanted, to die peacefully, pain-free and with dignity at home.

Once Grandma made this decision it was a frenzied time, family began pouring in from all over the US, from Alaska to Boston, and Grandma spoke with others who couldn't be with us on the phone.  She even seemed to recover a little, getting out of bed to enjoy a cocktail hour of sorts with her children on her bedroom deck.  She was laughing and she seemed relieved, re-energized by everyone's presence and that her decision was public and accepted.  She spent the next two days saying goodbye to her family, even though I don't know if any of us feel that we can say all that we want to in those moments.  There were some really sweet times with my family during those few days.  She allowed for this coming together of her family in the way she passed and I think all of us needed the time together to process, be together with her and each other.

The last thing I said to her was, "I'm going to yoga," fully expecting her to still be conscious when I returned two hours later.  She said, "yippee, good girl," and she truly meant it.  When I returned after what felt like one of the most powerful classes I've ever experienced, Grandma was unconscious and moving swiftly towards death.  I sat with her some more and told her more, just needing to hold and squeeze her hand a little more.  She passed a few hours later just as the sun was rising, while my uncle read her Shakespeare and the birds chirped outside her bedroom windows.

Throughout these weeks, I still cry sometimes, but I remind myself that this is what she wanted and she truly lived a full life, one filled with great love and I know the thing she'd want the most is to see her family and friends smiling.  This post is about honoring her and her spirit of embracing all that life can offer.  She relentlessly encouraged me to do everything despite limitations, be they financial or my own beliefs.  She believed in taking care of oneself.  

A day after she passed, her regular yoga class that she attended religiously three days a week, laid out a mat for her and placed flowers, candles and incense on it.  We didn't do a public or private celebration of Grandma, so this is my own way of processing the passing of Grandma.  Jean was an amazing woman; she wasn't a sweet old lady but an experienced, educated, and beautiful woman.   I won't write what her obituary says, but do read it here to learn more about this special woman.  

Here are a few photos of those few weeks with Grandma Jean.

Kitchen time with Great Grandma Jean.

Below is a video Andy took of Grandma trying to keep Samantha happy while I was at yoga one night.

Grandma dressed up in her favorite new Indian kurta headed to a friend's 90th birthday party down the block.

Samantha watching Grandma from the top of the stairs, one of her favorite places at Great Grandma Jean's.

Here's what Samantha usually did while I read to Grandma. 

Grandma & cousin Shannon at our last downtown cocktail hour.  Notice how much Grandma loved the kurtas?

One of the many neighborhood walks.

Andy preparing food for the pool party on Samantha's first birthday party, June 16th.

The first birthday celebration a few days earlier.  Grandma, Ty, us, and Logan.

Andy's version of a first birthday cake - syllabub.

This is what's on the bottom of the syllabub!

Hillside outside of Grandma's house.

View from the trail behind Grandma's house.

Samantha in the pool at Grandma's.  Can you tell how much she loved it?

Amber, me, Samantha and Kimberly in the pool!

Grandma chilling out on the deck.

Andy and Grandma reading in the basement the day of her fall.

While Samantha and I work on de-shelving the bookshelf!

Here's a proud mama picture for which I'm very grateful.  It was taken one week before Grandpa died last year.  We drove in to Colorado from Los Angeles and were so excited for Samantha to meet her namesakes, that we stopped first at their house.  Here's the moment where Jean and Sam get to meet Samantha Jean.  In one short year, Samantha Jean was born, Grandpa passed, we moved in with Grandma, then we moved to India, then we moved back to the US and back in with Grandma, then we spent a glorious five weeks with Grandma, and then Grandma passed.  

The cycle of life, coming and going.