Ed, you beat me to it on your post. I was actually considering writing an article on the very subject, but I wasn't sure if it would be too sensitive. But now that it's on the table, I'll throw out some thoughts.
As I put it to Jennifer when we got back from Iowa, I felt like our trip this summer had me run smack-dab into mortality. At our ages, I don't think many of us spend a ton of time thinking about death. Our friends would call us morbid and weird. It's not something that you bring up at B-Dubs over some spicy garlic chicken wings and a Shiner Bock. "Ain't nobody got time for that!"
It was tough seeing the Grandmas, and it always is. Grandmas Strempke was saying the same kind of things when we were there. Jennifer told Grandma she needed to quit saying that stuff because it upsets Dad (understandably so). But she's 99, and what does she have left? She can't hear well, and she can't see well either. Her body is worn out, and she can't do anything that she enjoys anymore. When you're 99 I guess there isn't much prospect of "getting better" either. As much as I intellectually understand her saying that, nobody is comfortable hearing someone that they love so much say that they want to die. It just feels wrong.
Our sweet Grandma Birchard is healthy as a horse, but she's mentally gone. That's different from Grandma Strempke, but equally difficult. It pains me, and I'm sure it does the rest of the family. We don't want to lose Grandma, but in some sense we've already lost her. To say that you hope somebody will die sounds incredibly cruel, but as is the case with people who suffer in a long battle with terminal illness, sometimes when the passing comes it's sad, but at the same time somewhat of a relief. Does any of this make any sense?
Jennifer and I have said for a long time that we hope that we go together before we get too old. Maybe there will be a carbon monoxide leak and we'll just go to sleep and never wake up. Maybe it will be a plane crash. I don't know. But I'm not going to lie - I don't like the prospect of growing old. I'm okay will passing in the night when I'm 75. The aging process scares me to death. We don't have any kids that are going to take care of us when we're old. We're trying to plan for that now, as crazy as it sounds.
Our Mom and Dad are absolute angels for the way that they've taken care of their mothers through the years, and the way they continue to do so. I don't know how they do it. I can hardly walk out of the nursing home without tears in my eyes. It's an emotional train wreck every time that I visit. I can't imagine the emotional toll that it is taking on them. And that's the next step in my thinking on our mortality, thoughts about our parents and their care. That's a conversation that isn't appropriate for a blog. Where did the years go?
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