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Tuesday, 26 August 2008 15:02![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
earthbelowI just got a call from my sister saying that my grandfather is in the hospital, and it's likely he's had a stroke. It sounds like he's stable for now, but they do not anticipate that his life is going to be much longer.
I've never lost a grandparent before. I still have great grandparents living.
I've been lucky until now. Death has been so unfamiliar to me, to my family. We've had to bury so few people in my lifetime, all of them very, very old.
I keep thinking about my grandmother, who's had to take care of him all this time, and about what she'll do. My uncle lives in the same town she does, so he's there for her.
I offered to go up there if someone was needed to go up there, and my father is going up to Kentucky (where they live) this weekend.
I just...this is the thing I dread. I dread getting calls in the middle of some random day telling me that I need to be prepared to have a member of my family not be there anymore. That someone is just gone.
I'm twenty-four and I still don't understand what that means, not entirely. And I still am afraid, because no matter how much religion people try to preach at me, I feel like a little child who's asking, "But what happens when you die?" and realizing that nobody has an answer, only guesses.
How is this how it happens? You exist and exist and exist and then suddenly don't. How is that the system, the world works like this? How can this be the way that things are set up?
I don't understand. I just don't. It doesn't make any sense.
I've never lost a grandparent before. I still have great grandparents living.
I've been lucky until now. Death has been so unfamiliar to me, to my family. We've had to bury so few people in my lifetime, all of them very, very old.
I keep thinking about my grandmother, who's had to take care of him all this time, and about what she'll do. My uncle lives in the same town she does, so he's there for her.
I offered to go up there if someone was needed to go up there, and my father is going up to Kentucky (where they live) this weekend.
I just...this is the thing I dread. I dread getting calls in the middle of some random day telling me that I need to be prepared to have a member of my family not be there anymore. That someone is just gone.
I'm twenty-four and I still don't understand what that means, not entirely. And I still am afraid, because no matter how much religion people try to preach at me, I feel like a little child who's asking, "But what happens when you die?" and realizing that nobody has an answer, only guesses.
How is this how it happens? You exist and exist and exist and then suddenly don't. How is that the system, the world works like this? How can this be the way that things are set up?
I don't understand. I just don't. It doesn't make any sense.
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no subject
Date: 26 Aug 2008 20:43 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Aug 2008 02:28 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Aug 2008 05:10 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Aug 2008 16:16 (UTC)no subject
Date: 27 Aug 2008 18:44 (UTC)I don't know if you have a faith or belief that you can turn to, or if the hard questions just linger for you with no answers.
In my Jewish prayerbook, there's a piece about the hardness of death and how we feel so desperate to stop it, so sad when it touches us. Then it goes on to ask if we would keep our loved ones forever in exchange for never seeing another new flower, another baby, another first blush of new love...
I personally do not believe that we exist and exist and suddenly don't..I just believe that things change and evolve in ways we don't understand.
But I get that that is precious little comfort when your grandfather is in the hospital and you're scared and hurting. Many blessings and good thoughts to him, your grandmother, your family and you.