Pieces of her life

This is going to be really, really long....Just saying.... :)

For the last few days, I've been over to my father in law's house with my wife and her sister and their brother and his wife and our house mate and my mother in law's sister and we've been going through me mother in law's stuff.

For one, we've been cleaning out refrigerators, yes more than one, and the food pantry. We've had to throw out piles and piles of food. The woman just kept buying more and more food. She had so much, she didn't remember what she had and what she didn't. So food got pushed to the back, and out of sight, out of mind. Oh man, there was stuff that had expired years ago. The record belonged to something that used to be food that expired in 1992. That's the year I graduated highschool. Talk about ancient history.

The housemate and I went through her piles of catalogs. Some people collect stamps or coins or antiques or newspapers or bottlecaps or whatever. She collected catalogs. Of course, it's also very easy to collect catalogs. Buy one thing from one catalog just one time and you'll be inundated with catalogs for life. The thing is, she never threw any of them out. And it wasn't just a matter of picking up a stack of catalogs and dumping them in the trash. No, we had to leaf through each one because interspersed were pieces of mail, receipts, bank statements, etc. The labor was not in vain, however, as my father in law was able to locate a receipt from Wal Mart for some shirts his wife had boughtened him but were too small. So he was able to return them. :D

The women folk, with occasional input from my wife's brother, have been going through the jewelry, taking notes of who wants what with the understanding that nothing was going to leave the house without final approval from the husband. And there was a ton of jewelry. I don't think they're even halfway done yet.

And there's still clothes and books and cosmetics and shoes and so on and so forth.

And what struck me is how intimate a process this is. We're going through her life, in a sense. See what kinds of food she bought. She how she took care of her husband who had gout and therefore certain dietary restrictions. She what kinds of foods she bought for herself because of her diabetes and other health issues. See how she was concerned about being able to feed me kosher foods (not strictly rabbinic kosher, Biblically kosher). And lo, how much we have to throw out. Are we discarding her in a way? Are we relegating her to the trash heap? I prefer to think not. I think she would have liked to clean out her refrigerators and pantry as well. She just never found the time to be able to do so. Still, it's a hard thing to do.

And with going through the catalogs and such, we found scraps of paper with her handwritten notes on them. Recipes, meal plans for birthday dinners, Christmas cookie lists, etc. It's stuff to pull on your heart strings. Yea, how she loved to cook. She often said that she learned to cook in "self-defense." Apparently, her mother, whom I never met, was an awful cook. I mean dreadful. I mean just terrible. Couldn't get a hot meal on the table to save her life. Couldn't manage to get all the various pieces done at the same time. And so me mother in law became a cook out of necessity and by the time I got to know her, her powers were at their height.

I have no interest in my mother in law's jewelry. I wear one piece of jewerly. Just one. My wedding band. But I don't object to me wife and her siblings and her aunt and our house mate going through the jewelry, of which there is a great deal and seeing what pieces catch their eye, or their heart, as the case may be. That's a long, difficult process, and the cause for many tears as people would recall specific instances of her wearing them or remembering occasions associated with them.

Pieces of her life. Little mementos to remember her by. It's not always the big shock of a sudden death that cuts your heart. Sometimes, it's the little things that will be missed. The words of affection, the hugs and kisses, the look and feel of her hair, the scent of her cooking. Periodically, some random thing will call to mind a memory long forgotten. A mother and child sitting together in a restaurant; a beautiful autumn day that calls to mind the tree outside their unit at Trapp; a photograph from a vacation that we took; a handwritten note found tucked away in some book; a song on the radio; a prayer. Such things cut deeply because we can't share them with her. When these things happen, all we have is her memory.

In going through her material possessions and throwing out that which can no longer be used and donating that which can be used but nobody in the fambly wants it's like we're saying goodbye. It will be a long, slow, difficult road. It will be strewn with tears, and sorrow and heartache. But there is also laughter as we remember funny moments, good times, how she loved to laugh, to sing, and to delight in her family.

There is a time to mourn and a time to dance. A time to laugh and a time to cry. And I have felt that the two should not mix. When mourning, mourn. Allow yourself to grieve, deeply. When laughing, laugh, deeply. When dancing, dance with all your might. Still, is not even this sadness tempered with joy? Is not the grief we feel somehow eased by the knowledge that she is with her Lord and Savior? Can we not smile through tears as we recall her goodness, her love, her light? I don't know. I struggle with this daily. I suppose the best thing is to be honest with our feelings. Don't surpress grief or joy because you feel either would be inappropriate.

Who can tell another what to say or how to feel? Who wants to hear, "well, when my mother died, I mourned for a year, and then I moved on." Or, "it's been a year, [a couple years, however long], don't you think it's time to move on?" Stop it! You don't know us! You don't know what we're feeling! How dare you tell us when it's time to move on?

Everybody's grieving process is different. Everybody takes a different amount of time to accept a loss. Not 'get over', accept. I don't think you ever truly get over a loss as deep as this.

May her memory always be for a blessing. May we call to mind the goodness that she shared even as we go through the pieces of her life.

Glory to God in the highest. Let peace descend on us, on all Israel, and all the world, and let us say, amen.