Marge Chapman

Exactly two years and one day ago I had my wisdom teeth removed. Surgery went well, although I didn’t experience any ‘fun’ side effects from the laughing gas. Also, it turns out that Percocet gives me a stomachache, so I ended up just taking ibuprofen and dealing with my aching gums. The next morning was a Saturday. When I woke up that morning my stomach was still upset, my mouth hurt, and I was rocking some chipmunk cheeks. To try to keep my mind off of all this, my parents and I sat at the kitchen table and played Bananagrams (It’s kind of like Scrabble but that’s not the point). The phone rang and my Mom got up to answer it. She returned to the kitchen and informed me that my Great-Grandmother passed away that morning. The first thought that popped into my head was that I never had a chance to say goodbye. Also, it turns out, crying is a whole new experience when you’ve got a bunch of gauze in your mouth.

I first met Great-Grannie when I was a baby, but I don’t remember that because, I was a baby (duh!). So I guess I really met her in sixth grade when she came to stay with my Grandy for a few weeks. My Mom warned my sister and I to be on our best behavior because Great-Grannie had a tendency to be strict and harsh, as she was a woman of her time, that time being her birth around the year 1915 (that’s an approximation because she always lied about her age, but we know she made it to at least 100!). So of course, I was apprehensive about her and Grandy coming over for dinner. When she arrived, I gave her a firm handshake as I introduced myself and I could tell she was pleased. My Dad poured a glass of her drink of choice, Scotch, and we all fell into simple conversation.

The two of us hit it off that night. I got her to tell story after story about her experience growing up on a farm in North Dakota. She spoke about all their dogs that they always named Trigger, the tramp that decided to take up residence in their barn, the gypsies, and the snowstorms that were so severe that they had to follow a clothesline from their house to the barn because otherwise they would have gotten lost in the Blizzard. She learned that I played the flute and so I played some songs for her after dinner. We hugged goodbye and she gave me a kiss on the cheek. After she left, my parents looked at me, dumbstruck. They told me they’d never seen her in bright spirits like that and that I brought something incredible out of her that night.

So for the next few weeks, Great-Grannie and Grandy came around for dinner often and we would chat and I would play the flute for her. But then it was time for her to return to North Dakota. I cried when I had to say goodbye and she was heartbroken too and wanted me to come with her. But of course, I had to stay. But we would exchange letters and talk on the phone sometimes. That Christmas, my sister and I got Christmas cards from her and five dollars each, which was actually a huge deal because she was known for her frugality and traditionally sent everyone only one dollar. But to my family’s amazement she also sent an old knife with a note attached. It explained that she used it to cut her and my belated Great-Grandfathers’ cake on their 25^th wedding anniversary and she hoped that my parents would use it when the time came too. And then she came back the next summer, and the summer after that.

But then she moved to Arizona the summer before I started high school. A few months later she had a stroke. She made a pretty good recovery considering she was well into her nineties, but she could no longer write very well and she had to use a walker (note that up until this point that she didn’t even use a cane!). For spring break that year, my family and drove to Arizona. We did visit her for one evening and took her out to dinner. We had a blast, and like always, she begged me to stay with her. I wish I had known then that that night was going to be the last time I ever saw her, or ever heard her voice.

See, life gets complicated. Certain circumstances led to me to being unable to contact her, even by phone, or letter, and I am not going to go into those details at this time. And obviously, I couldn’t go back to Arizona to visit her. But after I graduated high school I did receive a card from her, with a ten-dollar check (again, big deal because of her frugality). But I knew something was wrong because it was signed ‘Aunt Marge’ and was an anniversary card. But like I said, there was nothing I could do. That November she turned at least 100 so I got to see a newspaper article her hometown from North Dakota wrote about her. And less than a year later, she was gone. After she died, which allegedly was because she broke one of her bones (I’m not entirely sure about which one or how accurate this is, like I said the lines of communication were complicated) and she didn’t wake up after the doctors tried to do surgery, we learned that she had dementia. It is comforting to know that despite everything, even dementia, she still thought of me and loved me.

And now, here I am, two years later. My mouth wounds from the wisdom teeth removal have certainly healed, but moving on from the death of a loved one doesn’t work the same way. Yes, it becomes more manageable as time passes, but sometimes things come up and it brings back that old hurt. Great-Grannie is not the first, nor the last person I’ve known and loved to have died. Yet, the pain of losing someone is worth all of the love and shared memories. I love her and I miss her, but I am thankful to have known her. And death does not have the last word, because the memories are still alive and well and some day we will meet again.

If you’re intrigued by this post and looking forward to what I’ll write about in the future, you can expect a new post at some point in the future. Also, if you feel inclined, feel free to leave a comment below about what you think. Thanks for all your support and I hope you’ll come back the next time I post. Stay Amazing!