Famous Last Words...

I really need to do this post, so please just bear with me. Before I begin though, I want ALL of you to click right on over to Charity's blog and give her some (((((hugs))))) in her comments. She's having a really rough time right now, and she needs to know how much we all love and support her. Even if you're not a regular reader of my blog, PLEASE click over there and let her know that you were thinking of her. If you ARE a regular deeceetalks reader, then you already know how much I adore Char, and you also know that she's a Cherry, so share that Cherry love, ok?

Char is preparing for the death of her grandmother. She knows that it's going to happen very soon. She had to go say goodbye today. If you've lost someone close, and you knew in advance that the end was near, then you know the pain that Charity is feeling today. I think that losing someone this way is very hard, but I also think that you are very fortunate if you fall into this category. I know that sometimes people end up having long, drawn out, deaths, and it is incredibly painful to watch a loved one go through so much suffering. However, you have the chance to say goodbye. You get to go tell that person how much you love them, you can hug them one last time, you can look into their eyes and see their soul. There has to be a certain amount of closure that goes with this type of death. I'm not trying to trivialize this at all, so please don't think that. I just think that those of you that have the opportunity to say goodbye are very fortunate, and I hope that you take that chance if you ever have it.

See, I've been thinking about Charity and her Grandma all day long. I thought about her this morning on my drive in to work. I thought about her all day, while I was delivering food to tables and trying to keep a smile on my face. I thought about her while I was grocery shopping, and on the drive home. And I've been thinking about her most of the evening. I wish I could take away her pain, because I know how much she is hurting right now. But also, I envy her a little. Yes, I envy her.

I lost my mom a few days after Christmas, back in 2001. She lived in Texas with my Grams, and she was doing this huge multi-state visit over the Christmas holidays. She went to see my brother and niece first. Then she came to my house. She left my house on the 27th. We got into a HUGE fight on the 26th, and were still sort of in an argument on the 27th. Basically, I told her never to come back to my house. I was just so angry with her, because she'd been horrible to one of my kids, and I found it inexcusable. I mean, this kid was just a kid, and she's supposed to be an adult. Right? She should be above being mean, especially to one of her grandchildren. Well, my mom took everything personally, and she felt like this child had slighted her, and she went off on this child. And she may have been my mom, but we're talking about one of my babies. And frankly, NOBODY gets away with talking to ANY of my children the way that she talked to this child. So I let loose. With both barels. And took time to re-load. At least 4 times. Yeah, it was bad. We're talking almost bloody, ok? And it ended with me telling my mom that if she couldn't act like a grown-up and treat ALL of my children with love and respect, then I didn't ever want to see her at my house again, and NONE of the kids were allowed to be around her. She played favorites pretty bad sometimes, and that was another really big part of our fight.

Anyhow, on the morning that she left, we barely spoke. It was really tense, to say the least. I tried to be civil, but she didn't put in the same effort. Basically, she was leaving, and I didn't know when I'd see her again. You have to understand, this type of thing happened with my mom fairly regularly, so I wasn't even thinking that I'd never see her again. I mean, she got offended at people easily and often. The list of people that she wasn't speaking to was an ever-growing, constantly changing list. I knew that at the moment that she left, my name was at the top of that list, in BIG BOLD letters. It was a place on the list that I seemed to end up at least once every few months, and I knew I'd have to kiss some ass at some point in the future, but I also knew that I would stick to my guns on most of the issues. I just could not allow her to get away with being mean or petty to one of my babies, nor could I allow her to keep playing favorites. Some things I would give on, but not those two things. If you have kids, you know what I mean.

She packed up her car and said goodbye to most of the kids. I made the one in question go out and give her a hug. Then, before she drove away, I had this crushing weight on my chest. This thought kept flashing in my mind, like one of those flashing amber alert highway signs..."This could be the last time you ever see her. Go tell her you love her." Of couse, I pushed the thought away quite a few times, but then, something made me just run right out of the house and jerk her car door open. I grabbed her and hugged her, and told her that I loved her. Then I stood there in my driveway and watched her drive away, feeling like a fool for my last minute hug. She hadn't hugged me back, or returned my sentiments. The next time I saw her, she was lying in a casket.

Shane had that Friday off from work, and we'd spent the morning in town doing errands. When we got home, there were 13 messages on the answering machine. I just looked at the number and felt my pulse start to race. I knew that something horrible had happened to someone that I loved, because we NEVER get that many messages. Shane asked if I wanted him to play them, and I said "Not yet". I waited a few minutes, I'm not sure why, then I walked over and hit Play. Six were from my step-father and 7 were from my brother. I called my step-father first, because I really wasn't ready to talk to my brother yet. My step-father told me that my "mama" was dead. I honestly thought he meant my grandmother, because that's what I've always called her. I only started calling her Grams recently, because of my kids. When he mentioned my "grandma" being stuck in Little Rock, I just dropped the phone. Shane looked at me, then at the phone on the floor, and asked what was wrong. I can remember telling him that I thought that Paul just told me that my mom was dead, but I wasn't sure, and telling Shane to call my brother right away. I don't know what my husband said to my step-father because I couldn't hear anything above the roar of grief that my soul was making. The next thing I knew, I was talking to my brother, and crying, and trying to figure out who had died, and what the hell had happened to my family. Mom passed away in a hotel in Little Rock. She'd died in her sleep. She had a morphine pump that was implanted in her hip, for back pain. She was on her way back to Texas to have back surgery so she could have the pain medication pump removed. Her official cause of death was morphine overdose, although they couldn't determine if the pump had actually malfunctioned or not.

Over the next few days, as we told the kids about Mom's death and prepared to make the trip to Oklahoma and Texas for the funeral and all of the million things that you have to do when someone dies, all I could think about was that last morning. Something made me run out of my house, go out on a limb, and tell my mom that I loved her. Something made me wrap my arms around her, and bury my head in her neck and whisper those words one last time. I had no idea that it would be the last time, or I would have said so very much more. But you know what? I said the most important thing I could have said. I didn't know that they would be my famous last words to my mom, all I knew was that I didn't want her driving away with my last words to her being words of anger.

I often think about those last few days, and especially those last few minutes, that I had with my mom. It hurts to know that I won't see her again here on earth. After almost 5 years, I still have times when I pick up the phone to call her and then remember that she's gone. It took me almost 3 years to erase my last phone message from her, just because I wanted to be able to hear her voice. There is still a Diet Dr. Pepper in my fridge from hr alst visit, and there probably always will be. But I have peace.

I said those last words to her. I told her the big stuff, even if that only consisted of three very small, but hugely important, words. Please remember this story when dealing with the ones that you love. Don't ever give up the chance to say those words. Don't ever let someone leave you, or you leave them, without telling them you love them. Even if you're mad, even if you're hurting, even if you feel they may not deserve to hear those words, SAY THEM. Don't let your famous last words be words that you will forever regret.

And please go on over and give Char some love. She really needs it. She's saying her last words today, and it's tougher than you can probably imagine.

Thanks.