Loose ends, # 3

A Good Death

My fifth grade Sunday School teacher, Mr. Taylor, scolded us one Sunday morning for showing up without a writing instrument.

It was a small matter, I suppose, carrying a pen, but I remember his admonition; I am seldom without a pen.  Now, of course, I always carry a book too, just in case I have "down time." These days I am willing as well to speak in public on short notice or to write should the opportunity arise.

One such opportunity came this last winter just as the "Busan Journal" focus of my blog had, finally, run its course.

We received an email from my cousin Minda that one of my mother's twin sisters, Viola, had died after a period of failing health. Aunt Viola and Aunt Alberta, the surviving twin, were approaching 94; they had lived near each other, except for short periods, their entire lives.

Both of my aunts, like my mother, had lost their husbands decades ago. Both were feeble physically but sharp mentally. My mother, two years younger, has been losing ground to Alzheimer's for several years.

The only other bits of detail you might need for what follows is that my mother and her sisters had a brother, Dean, who died from an infection when he was fourteen.

Time, distance, circumstances, obligations being what they are, I did not go to my Aunt Viola's memorial service.

Instead, I wrote the following short piece, which my oldest brother read at the service as an expression of affection from our side of the family. I offer it here, now, because it is one of the more important -- and hardest -- things I have ever had opportunity to write.

In Memorium, with Gratitude

"We had anticipated that we would be hearing this news sooner rather than later.  Nevertheless, I found myself silenced by it.  For a person who works with words all the time,  I frequently find myself confronted by the need to be silent.  Let God work in that silence.  Let Aunt Viola continue to live in that space in my heart where she has been my whole life. I think I am ready, now, to offer some words.

"I have benefited many time, as we all have, by Aunt Viola’s good life.  Now, at this sad moment, I feel I am benefitting by her good death. I hope that will not be thought an insensitive thing to say. As always, she led by example, and it is a good example, to be honored, to be emulated even if it comes to that. Thank you, Aunt Viola.

"I have many memories of Aunt Viola, but the one that jumps to the foreground at this moment is from the early 1960’s.  My father was building a house for us on Faculty Road in Durham, NH, with Grampa Nordstrom’s considerable help.  During that construction filled summer, the two Aunts come to New Hampshire to help.  Maybe that was not the original plan, but true to their character once they arrived and saw that help was needed there was no question but that they had come to help.  They would help. Period.  Over what seemed to me (as a 12 year old) to be endless weeks, we had set up an assembly line in the living room to paint siding.  It is a big house, and there was a lot of siding.  How vividly I remember Aunt Viola painting strip after strip of siding set up on saw horses, starting early, staying late, working steadily and quickly, singing hymns, telling stories, arguing from time to time in that familiar way the sisters had, alternately encouraging and admonishing me to keep the pieces coming or to take them away, setting an example of hard work, cooperation, and good cheer for a boy who wanted more than anything to be done already. As a 63 year old man looking back 50 years, I must say, the memory and the lesson are vivid.  They have served me well. Thank you, Aunt Viola.

"My wife, Donna, remarked when we first shared your email, Minda, that Aunt Viola’s passing was the beginning of the passing of that generation.  A deeply sad beginning, however much expected. Aunt Albert has had health problems that have weakened her constitution.  We have been losing my mother slowly for some years now, a loss that creates a different kind of grieving.  I know what Donna meant; we always think of the three sisters together.  For all of their children, I imagine, it has been “Mom and her sisters.”  Now Aunt Viola is gone from our daily lives.

"What occurs to me now is that we have lost a lot of that generation already.  We lost Uncle Dean Nordstrom before we even had opportunity to know him.  We have lost all the husbands what seems like generations ago:  Uncle Anton first; Uncle Milford; my father.  All comparatively young men.  So it is not, for me at least, so much that Aunt Viola’s passing is the beginning of the loss of this generation; that began long ago.  For me, the remarkable thing is that God has granted us this long reprieve, this extra time.  We have had the sisters with us for far longer than we might have hoped.  What a blessing that has been.  For these extra years of Aunt Viola’s life, I am profoundly grateful. Well done, good and faithful Aunt.  You have blessed us in and through your life.  Now you have blessed us in leaving. Your note, Minda, that you heard a knock on your door that must have been Aunt Viola leaving, sounds exactly right.  She would have departed without fanfare, but letting you know “I’m going.”