Saturday, November 24, 2012

Grateful


The long, never ending highway of grief continues.  My husband's maternal grandmother passed away two days before Thanksgiving.  As if remembering this last holiday without my son wasn't hard enough to get through, this wonderful woman leaves us.  We won't be going to Morocco at this time but we were dreaming about going in April and still might, inshallah.  My husband calls his mother every night.  She paid a few thousand dollars to create a tent outside the house on the plaza and is feeding all who come by to pay their respects.  Relatives are still arriving from all over the country and the house is full of guests.  I wish we were there to help.  There is so much that goes with grief I wish we were there for, those that come to comfort you and those that just cause more pain.  His aunt was telling my husband how there are people there wanting to be waited on hand and foot while all this wailing goes on around them.  It was so horrible to hear about his grandmother's condition at the end.  

I think back of being with her in her bedroom in 2002 and her showing me photos of herself in her twenties.  She was so proud of being a "hottie".  I am also thankful that I remember better times with her - when the disease was just starting and her arms just starting to shake.  She was still able to get around great, so filled with life and able to let me know how much I meant to her.  One time she came fully dressed into the hammam (the baths) to give me shwika for my teeth - this horrible tasting stuff that cleans and makes them white - going past everyone and yelling in Arabic to them things that made them howl with laughter until she found me naked and being washed in the back hottest room with the girls covered in henna and babies playing in buckets of cool water.  I remember going off with my husband/then fiance to Agadir and when the cab came to get us it was dawn and I clearly remember his mom and grandmother in the front window of the house staring down at me, waving and blowing kisses.  What were they thinking about this American girl in an Adidas track suit and baseball cap that had come to take their golden boy away?  So many great memories I hold on to with fondness.  Anyway, we're doing better today. 

To take our minds off things we went and saw the movie Life of Pi yesterday.  It was in 3D and visually stunning like the reports say.  Such a spiritual and colorful story, it would be hard to believe if you heard it from someone.  Impossible and amazing things happen all the time to people and yet they come through them still internalizing and processing, asking the age old question, "Why did this happen to me, why was I chosen for this, and what am I to do with it after this experience is over?  Wait for some journalist to come along and put it into eloquent words and make it into a movie?"   

As for my health, I would just like to wake up one morning and not be afraid of what might be happening next.  Got up Friday morning at 5:30am, drank my barium and made it to my CAT scan on time.  Almost forgot about the horrors of diarrhea for a moment until it came rushing back.  Been trying to flush the stuff out of my system now.  I have the results on CD and may try to look at it later.  Last time I had the film and looked at it I could see I needed more medical training to notice anything.  Hope nothing is visible for me on it this time.  There is still the colonoscopy appointment to do on Tuesday.  Saw the oncologist last week and she reports that she sees nothing in the vagina but ordered the CAT scan with and w/o contrast to be sure.  Almost cried in her office when she told me.  The feeling of having the mass there has subsided but I know something is still there, it just may have shrunk and I'm grateful for that.  It's a beautiful day and people are in a shopping mood.  Not me, just thankful I'm still here to shop another day.  

Still trying to get my bedroom dark, putting in foam board in that upper window today.  Can't sleep unless it's a cave in there.  I hope to get to the Post Office to mail out more family photographs I found and call my drummer friend today.  His home was recently robbed twice and he is an older gentleman that doesn't need this kind of stress.  I can hear his silky voice shaken by it.  I'm so sorry he got displaced during my latest sad news.  I was hoping to have him here for Thanksgiving dinner it just didn't turn out to be a good time for company.  Anyway, that's my news.   Hope all is well with you and you are getting your Christmas decorating done.   So grateful to be able to think of you, toast to you, and wish you well this holiday.  Here's to good health - Your health is your Wealth!

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