Three days later I was driving to pick up school uniforms from a friend. Her sons had outgrown them, and my son would need them for the school he was starting in the fall. Under normal circumstances I'd call my grandmother in the car while driving home from work. Honestly, without a commute, that didn't happen very much lately, but I did still occasionally call her when I was parked outside during my duaghter's dance class. I thought about calling her on the drive over, but hadn't been to this friend's house before and knew I'd need my phone to navigate. I made the decision that once I picked up the clothes, I'd call her on my way to pick up my son from preschool.
As I was turning into her neighborhood, my dad called. I silenced the phone since I was only a couple turns away, and told msyelf as soon as I picked up the clothes from her porch I'd call my dad back first and then my grandma.
Except, as you might guess by the fact I'm actually writing something here, that didn't happen. Instead my dad was calling to tell me that my grandmother had died about an hour ago.
My grandma had turned 89 earlier this year, so it wasn't too much of a surprise, even when my dad told me it was close a couple of weeks ago. I know the last decade especially has been really hard for her. She lost my grandfather just over 11 years ago, and then my mom, her daughter, 18 months after that. About 3 years ago she had a bad fall and had to move out of the retirment community she had lived in with my grandfather. And then of course there was COVID. I would talk to her and she'd tell me how alone she was, how they'd bring her food and she'd eat in her room, alone, by herself. She had lost so many loved one throughout the years, and her life was so different from what it once was barely 10 years ago.
With all that said, I'll still miss her. Similar to the posts I wrote when my grandpa and my mom died, I wanted to share a handful of photos of her looking back on her life.
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