So my September started out in the weee hours of September 1st with me about levitating off of my bed after my husbands phone started ringing. I really don’t know what time it was. I think that it was somewhere around 3 AM but I’m really not certain. All I know is that after answering the phone, my husbands next response was, ‘I’m on my way.’ A sure sign that whatever is going on is nothing good. (Not that you expect it to be good when someone calls you in the middle of the night. At least I don’t. In my world, I’m kind of right there with Bailey from Grey’s Anatomy. If you wake me up, somebody better be dying. Dying, but not dead, because then you would have just woken me up for no good reason.) This really was not a good sign to start a day on, let alone a month.
The phone call was from my niece, saying that she thought that Nana, (my mother in law) had passed away. We had known that she didn’t have much time left. My mother in law had been slowly slipping away from us for a long time, as her health deteriorated and her mind slipped away to years long gone by. It had been so long that my younger kids don’t even remember the time from before. When Nana still knew who they were and made the best homemade peanut butter fudge to ever grace my taste buds.
A few hours later, Nana is home in heaven. Her earthly remains in transit, working their way towards their final resting place. My husbands back home, cup of coffee in hand, when seemingly randomly he says, ‘Next time, if we get a Town and Country van, I want to know the complete history of it before we buy it.’ ??? I’m sitting there next to him, completely confused. He drove a car that morning. Where in the world is this coming from? So I say, ‘Ok…?’ Well, apparently the funeral home that they called to come and pick up Nana doesn’t have, or doesn’t just have hearses. They also have Chrysler town and country’s. Which is what they used to come get her. And apparently the idea of accidentally buying a vehicle that has been used for that type of transportation was where his mind got stuck that morning. (It’s ok to laugh. I know it’s funny. Morbid yes, but still a little funny. Disturbing a bit, but still good for a little chuckle.)
Long story short, it was a crazy week. One I know we still haven’t seen the full fall out from. The day of the funeral I realized something. For all of the losses we’ve had, there is still this part of my brain that still gets stuck in the mindset of, ‘If I can just get through the funeral. I just need to make it to and through the funeral.’ Even though I KNOW from experience that historically, things only get worse after the funeral. But there I was, at the funeral, thinking, ‘I just have to get through the next few hours.’ I’ve had so many people say that to me, ‘I just have to get through the funeral.’ I’ve looked at those same people, with my heart aching, and thought, ‘Oh honey, it’s only going to get so much worse after the funeral.’ Yet, there I was. Caught up in that same mindset. That same lie that we tell ourselves time and time again.
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