It was the period of time when my grandma passed...My dad's mom. I was faced with someone close to me who had been part of my like for quite some time in the process of...I'll call it passing on...
I call it this because of my beliefs, and hope that it becomes clear as I tell this story....
Her and my grandfather had been staying with my dad and his girlfriend of ten plus years, and her 16 year old daughter for sometime while she fought and eventually lost to cancer.
Eventually my "step mom" ...my dad's girlfriend couldn't take it anymore. She walked out; moved out a short time before my grandma passed...I get it... I understand why she did. I'm not sure I could have expected so much of someone at that moment in time. Trying to raise a 16 year old daughter. Working 12-16 hours a day seven days on, one off,and then six on, come home, and seemingly have to take care of my grandmother, my dad, my grandpa, her daughter as well as herself! She couldn't keep doing it.
My dad called in the entire family...one of six other brothers, sisters, and their families didn't show up. His older brother didn't make it and I guess nobody expected him to, and nobody talks about it... At least not in front of me.
As the family waited for the youngest of seven to get there...there was time for me to be with, and around my dying grandmother...
Before her heart stopped beating she was already gone. Laying there in that bed was not her.
Now mind you, her religion kind of contradicts what happened...
I sat at the kitchen table at my dad's house. In front of me I wrote questions and answers from her. I left it sit there for...what could be a few hours. Let the family see it. Came back to it and threw it away.
I'm not exactly sure how long it was before she passed after all who were going to be there were there. But when I got back to work a short time later I was conflicted...
I remember sitting on the bench in front of our break room at work...having a cigarette. The piping above where I was there was a crow.
I didn't think anything of the crow or the white feather that happened in the air because we have seagulls that shit all over our cars at my work. It happened again the following day.., break, cigarette, crow, white feather.
So I grabbed the feather on the second day, took it home, and asked my girlfriends mom about what she knew regarding Native American religious beliefs involving animals. I asked her this as she's kind of a hippie in a way... Grown up hippie??? Anyway, she brings me back this book. Animal Medicine, or something along those lines. I open the book, and two pages in, is a printed drawing of a feather.
So I looked on what it said about the crow.
When I looked up what the crow said, it stated something along the lines of being able to see both this plane of existence and another.
It's what I needed to read. I'll tell you why...
My grandmother and I had different ideas concerning what happens when you die. I'm kind of the black sheep of the family. Either me or my uncle Shane, who's a month younger than me, who hasn't talked to his dad in years from what I understand...He stopped going to their religion(Jehovah's Witnesses).
I know she's somewhere different. I know that she didn't just cease to exist in this vast universe. She's still around. I once saw her in a dream... It was one of the most memorable things I have...A dream. She was washing dishes at the house she lived in in Montana. I was looking down on her from above. She looked up at me and smiled. I had never seen my grandma that happy. It's as if that smile weren't hers. It was so bright.
I try not to push my beliefs (too hard)(twss), but whatever nirvana, what ever deep love that you have in your being; exists those that we lose. We can't touch them or feel them always, but we can find comfort in their presence. In memories or dream.
Ps.
**I eventually got myself to a chiropractor to get treated for my headaches as per my grandmothers request. I'm happy to say that this year I have yet to have a cycle of headaches that haven been quoted as being as severe as natural child labor/birth. Three to four times a day. For up to six weeks(for me). This has been the first year without them in 13 years.
**Quitting smoking is a battle. It has been a challenging road. It is said to be harder to kick than heroin... Either way, the best way to quit is to just do it and don't look back.
Namaste.
