My grandparents on my dad’s side have been married for 61 years. They got married when “Til Death do us part” really meant forever. The commitment they made many years ago has withstood many trials, I’m sure. Of course, being a grandchild, I’ve had no idea what those hurdles were, until now. Until this one.
The sun is beginning to set on my Nana’s last days. Her body is betraying her. Her health is failing her. Her heart and soul remain constant, unchanged. Except, you can’t tell by looking at her. Often, her eyes are blank. She is asleep more than she is awake. Her words are gone or sometimes confusing. She is not the vibrant woman that raised four children. She is not the upbeat, energetic grandmother that kept us on the go when we would go visit and spend the week during the summer. She does not look like the same woman who looked cancer square in the eye in her seventies, and said, “Take that!” as we watched her cancer shrink back from her in defeat.
She does not return the conversation, the interests or the affection she once did to her husband, my Grandaddy. But his love and commitment to her, remains unchanged. It is hard on him, as it would be on anyone, watching someone they love deteriorate into a shell of what they once were. It is beyond my comprehension to imagine what it is like to watch the love of your life slip away from you one day at a time, but sometimes Grandaddy gives us a glimpse of what has become his existence these days. Yesterday, he sent an email to his children and grandchildren that I thought was especially touching and telling of his thoughts and feelings:
May 26, 2008 It’s Memorial Day, and up in one of the city parks the community is observing the special day and honoring all its veterans, the living and the dead; but tonight I choose to memorialize your Mom and Nana by reporting a little reverie I had yesterday after her breakfast time. She was sleeping, as she often, perhaps usually, does. I sat near her bed and took her frail little right hand in my left hand, as I first did in August, 1940, on our walk from the top of The Hill in front of Ayers Hall to her dorm for the week on the corner of 16th and West Cumberland.
This was my first act of touching her purposefully just for the pleasure of it. Hoping she felt the same, I asked quietly, “Do you mind?” For all these nearly 68 years I’ve remembered her quiet, sweet, magical response, “Uh-ugh.” (However it is spelled. No way I can capture the magic of that moment in print anyway.) Now, in May 2008, perhaps nearing the last days, weeks, months of our togetherness, I was holding that hand again; but I didn’t have to ask her if she minded; I knew she didn’t.
The reverie passed, as it were a moving picture of many events, both clearly remembered and imagined, as the rapid pace of life lived as husband and wife, daddy and mother sped before my mind’s eyes- events which involved that little hand. I saw it again on August 13, 1946, as it slipped a wedding band on my 3rd finger, left hand. Prior to that on campus at MSCW its partner on her left side had received a little engagement diamond, the giving hand thrilling again to the touch and the receptivity of the receiving digit.
Of course I thought of all the multitude of times that right hand had done its part in making organ and piano keyboards sing beautiful music, and how hard it had worked to play for Linda Newman’s wedding that difficult Tocata, Linda herself being an accomplished keyboardist, how it had accompanied Russell Newport in concert here in Huntingdon. I remembered how that many people here had requested that she play that beautiful combination of “Jesus Loves Me” and “Lieberstraum.”
I’m sure that her greatest pleasure had come from that special hand working with its portside mate in doing a thousand little tasks as mother to P,D.K,and B - from changing diapers to washing them, and reapplying them deftly without sticking her fingers. Consider all the meals it had helped to prepare and the bandaids applied, accompanied with a kiss and soothing words which only a mother can say. I even recall that she sustained a painful, nasty little cut on its forefinger as she opened a can of food early in our marriage, when we lived in one room and a pantry with stove and a few shelves, and shared both the refrigerator and bathroom with a family of three.
Think of all those times she used that left hand to write notes and letters expressing love and encouragement to family and friends and of numerous caresses she has given all of us who have received her love.
So, thank You, Father, for the privilege of holding that little left hand, then and now. It is not as warm and vibrant as it was then. The thrill of that simple, innocent, expression of affection circa 1940 has become now weak and often cold and feeble, but it is still part of a very dear lady’s very being. It has done, probably, most of its work - and done it well. Thank You, Lord, for that hand, for that life, for that lady.
As much as I hate to think about the “Til Death do us part” thing in my own marriage. I can only hope to have so many years of precious memories to cling to. Nana and Grandaddy may be approaching the twilight of their journey together, but what a journey they have been blessed with. God has been very good to them. And to us. For having been a part of their journey.
