The Grief of my Father and the end my Grand, parental loss

As I lay there in my bed this morning--I was brought out of my R.E.M. sleep back into this world of the "living." My phone, playing the role of an alarm clock, had the picture of my mother on the front cover, and miffed at the interuption I decided to continue sleeping.

Earlier in the week my mother had asked that I investigate on her behalf for a new Dell tower because her tower from e-Machines had decided to crash. Anyway, when I finally woke up I realized I had several missed calls and that three voice-mails later I was calling my parents. My grandmother had passed away.

This beautiful woman was to my father both his father and mother in one. You see, my father had lost his dad when he was only 11 years old and it was my grandmother, whom I always called Mina (pronounced My-Nah), who raised 9 children on her own. I have seen the place where my father grew up, and though a luscious play ground on the French colonized island of St. Lucia, it has since held to the epitome of what is poor.

At the saddened news I knew not what to tell my father about his loss, and knew less of my now defunct claim that at least one Grand parent was still alive and well. It was a great loss indeed! My father has a weakened heart, and my concerns were about his welfare. He was close to his mother.

The subject of death has been examined by me in the annals and dark corridors of literature. The Bible, the greatest literary text in any language known to humankind has extensive knowledge on the subject. Further, the subject of death and dying has been found by me in Beowulf and in the The Battle of Maldon. These literary examples contribute to my mistrust in death. What is more, the death of a literary character and the rebirthing of its author takes place in the greatest novel ever written, namely Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quijote; specifically, the second volume of the two-part text.

By experience then, I lost my mother's father about 4 years ago, my grandmother in half that time, and most recently my father's mother. Recall, I never knew or met my father's dad, but from what I can picture he apparently lives on in the genetic make up of my brother and the work ethic of my father.

Death is no respecter of persons, but it does situate the living in the context of finality, and though I do not mean for this blog post to exist in a morbid parameter--you must be aware of it! I would challenge all of you who have lost and still have, to consider your state with your own respective families and perhaps answer the phone when they call a little quicker, perhaps stay on the line just a little longer, perhaps listen a little more and even say, "I love you," or its equivalent.

Make it happen--do not wait for it to happen, because death does not wait in the shadows as I thought, but comes in the early sunrise morning over the horizon of the French mountains in St. Lucia, and sends its rays of warm sunlight on the uneven, galvanized roof and stone-hewn deck of my grandmother's home. She lives on in mere memory and in familiar iconography. I...love her still.

F.