On the Near Time of Death

This is a week that is burned into my memory.  In 2006 I was witnessing and experiencing the final days of Sheila's life under hospice care at Hospice Savannah.  She knew she was terminal and she finally took herself off the pills that were shrinking her brain (and allowing her to live) and signalled to me to have her Mom -- Millie return to Savannah. 

Millie returned -- had a few good days with Sheila (and me, and the cousin) and then just as suddenly as the first incident of aphasia on the Cancer Ward of Candler Hospital occurred -- Sheila was in the final hours of her life. I will never forget that last night/morning: being awakened by what I thought was Sheila's "call to me" to "wake up"; our last few hours together, and the day of her passing.  It was a "passing" into what I hope was a much happier life for She, though not for me (or Millie, or so many others).  I wish I could have been a better, more understanding person to respond to Millie's odd grief behaviors -- but I was not.  I was selfish -- so selfish that I thought that this was my death too.  It was not; nor was it Millie's death.  It was Sheila's passing --pure and simple, pure and beautiful, pure and final. I love her still.