I am a little hesitant to make New Year’s resolutions. Can you tell? I am especially reluctant this year because it will likely be a tough year emotionally. Grandma is not doing well, my mother seems to think she is just basically running out of energy and has called me several times this year feeling at her wit’s end. I am planning on going home in January and my sense is that it won’t be a restful visit. My mother called today and said she thinks grandma is hanging on for my visit and after that she is very uncertain. Mom is not the overly dramatic type and interestingly, earlier this year she expressed to me that she was not ready for her to go and now she feels sad watching my grandma struggle so hard with fatigue and try so hard just to do routine things and is more ready to let her go. It doesn’t matter if your parents or grandparents are elderly and ill and running out of steam…. nobody entirely wants to let go. I am steeling myself for a sad visit.
A little sadness is good, I think. We spend so much time effort and energy into avoiding pain and sadness that when it hurts you perhaps it is more intense? Life is sad, that is the price we sometimes pay for living for being allowed to experience the wonders of the universe. Everything does not have a happy ending. Sometimes there are no clear cut resolutions and we don’t get that “closure” we seek probably because life and the universe is an endless wheel not a 30 minute sit com or an hour long family drama in which the main character just hug it out at the end. Packages are not always wrapped neatly in our world, we are not always as witty, articulate or as wise as we think we should be and loved ones who were once vibrant just lose that light. It is all at once so simple and very very complicated.
A few simple goals for myself this year. Get back on the exercise wagon, keep up with my housework in a more systemic way, learn to deal with my anger triggered by a few particular people at work who always seem to know how to get my inner goat, and accept that my grandma might just be ready to vacate the world soon whether we want her to or not.
What are your hopeful goals this year????
Remember…. hang out and chit chat but don’t rec pony party, when you are done here go read one of the excellent offerings on our recent and rec’d list.
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Just tomatoes, carrots, my own version of “herbs de provence” meat and wine. This is my personal opinion…. I don’t trust a stew recipe that has the words “quick” in it, I like mine to simmer for a long time.
relationships with men who have egos larger than Semi-Trucks and nothing to back it up with.
This will be about the 10th time I’ve had to tell myself that.
i took care of MrD’s parents during their end time. I tried very hard to do every possible thing to make them comfortable & happy. sometimes nothing is enough… life has been lived, it’s time to move on. my mother-in-law i think had ahlzheimers (pronounced= old timers) she would tell the same few stories over and over… and also repeatedly said ‘i’m tired, i want to go home’ it finally hit me exactly what she was saying… she was tired of life… and home? i just have to believe there IS life after
strength to you & your mom to come to grips with this huge change. having an older generation gone is f-in’ scarey… i’m still coming to terms with having to sit at the adult table…
in fact i’ve quite decided that’s exactly why i went into depression after all too many deaths in the family…. i’m NOT ready to be the grown-up, i don’t want to be the oldest generation.
I hope Zoey loves me as much as you love your grandmother 😉 I have spent a few years married to this soldier person and with this Iraq business feeling very scattered and very sad. Nice thing it is a process. This year will be spent enjoying more structured living. I find that I’m able to read again and enjoy it. I have started to do some artistic things in clay again lately…..couldn’t do any of that either before. My world was falling apart. I was pretty distraught before and reading or doing things for my personal enjoyment seemed to be painful. Of course Zoey is healthy as a baby horse (pony), gorgeous, stunning, and already brilliant and life is full of beginnings and endings. It always seemed silly to me to talk about how much babies weigh and how long they are….like pumpkins at the fair…but she came in at 6 lbs 15 oz and 19.5 inches long. I think she’s a pretty good pumpkin 😉