Gifts

(Sorry I changed it)
I sit at the computer and read how she only has weeks left. The incomprehensible thought of how she will never see her daughters get married. Or her son enter Jr. High. Pain floods every portion of my body as tears of loss run down my face. Why did this happen to us? Thoughts run through my head of how this could only happen to 1 in like 30 billion people. It had to happen to her though. The worst cancer someone can get and it had to happen to her. I write an email telling how sorry I am but I erase it. It’s terrible. I start another but erase that one as well. I think of our own mortality and how something can seem insignificant like watching a movie or reading a book because you know that it doesn't matter cause you will die anyways. It doesn't seem fair that others can enjoy another Christmas or Thanksgiving but you don't get to. Not fair at all. I stand from the computer and leave the room too overwhelmed to stay in there. Walking aimlessly anywhere my feet decide. I find my self in my room and I am crying but I don't remember getting there. I fall to my bed and weep. Sobs tearing at my chest. To feel no pain would be heaven. Not to feel the loss of someone you love. I lay and cry for uncountable amount of time. Slowly and unwillingly I finally slip into sleep. I awake groggy and confused. Wishing I knew where I am and what I am doing there. Suddenly I remember as it all floods back in. I think to myself how she wouldn't want me to feel like this. She would want me to be happy and know that she is at peace with this. But I say crap to that. How could one be ok with dying? I don't understand. But try to cause the greatest gift I can give is to be at peace as well. To understand the she is with her family now and that is all that matters and we should take it for what its worth.

Dealing with a death is hard. We want to blame someone, anyone. We hope that this is all a joke and they will be fine. We scream, we cry, we question ourself but in the end all that you have accomplished is nothing. I hated what was going on. I hated the fact that she was dying. I cried, I screamed, I even blamed. Then nothing. For awhile all I felt was nothing. We all have to go through the grieving process but in the end we have to accept it. Death to some is only a step. Gandalf the White says "No the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path one that we all must take." The return of the King. We must come to realize that death is normal. I want my Aunt to remember me as being brave. Not afraid for her. For her children to be strong. My family and I are traveling the 14-hour trip to see her for Thanksgiving. This will be the hardest thing that I have ever had to do.

The memories I have of her are few but ones that I will look back on and smile. She was always there for us. Up in Hebgen with all the children running around crazily, she was always the calm one. She loved us no matter how many messes we made, how many puzzle pieces were flung across the room. No matter how much noise was made, how loud our tantrums were. She loved us. I want to remember her. Her life is a gift.

In the end I figured why give one gife. I want my gift to be multiple gifts. But then I realized I wasn't the one giving the gift. I was the one receiving. The gifts I'd been giving are one of memory, Gifts of laughter, Gifts of hope, Gifts of Life. And that is enough for me. I finally understand.