One Last Goodbye By: Tara Lambert
As I step into the funeral parlor, a cool breeze brushed down by back giving me chills. I glance around the corner to find a room with rows upon rows of soft chairs. My mind goes blank as I look into the casket and I can’t help but wonder: Is this really happening? I just can’t believe that my grandma is dead. My grandma had been suffering for so long now, but I didn’t know when the day would come. Seeing her is like taking a bullet to the chest. Shredding me open from the insides and leaving a permanent mark on my heart. I know it will be difficult to stitch back my broken heart; it will never go back to how it was before. The wounds from the loss won’t always show, but the pain will always be there. I remember the lazy afternoon card games I used to play with my grandma before she passed. I would slowly open the wooden door that led into the narrow hallway of my apartment hallway. I remember the creaking noise each step made as I hopped down the staircase to the first floor of my family’s shared apartment building. I found my grandma sitting on the couch watching one of her favorite movies. Or I would stroll through the living room into the dated kitchen to find my grandma listening to music on the old speaker that attached to the wall. She’d always offer me the same things to eat: her delectable homemade eggs, chocolate Chips Ahoy cookies, or a bubbly glass or orange soda. Afterwards we would always play cards together. Concentration was her favorite, but mine was war. We’d play cards for hours, as if time had no meaning or no effect on us. But that was a few years ago, when she was still healthy. I now walk over to my other family members and hug them with open arms. Today, our hugs seemed a little tighter and seemed to last longer than they had ever before. I make my way
over to my cousins Corinne and Leah and embrace them. I remember like it was just yesterday when my mom and aunt had informed us that Grandma was diagnosed with cancer. “As you know Grandma hasn’t been feeling well lately, so we took her to the doctor,” my aunt struggled to get the words out of her mouth. “Grandma was diagnosed with Colon Cancer,” my mom uttered with a crackling voice. The words pierced my ears like a needle and sounded like nails on a chalk board. My mom and aunt came over and told us that everything was going to be okay, that we didn’t need to worry about Grandma. They hugged us and kissed us goodnight. But I knew neither my cousins nor myself would be sleeping anytime soon. My mom and my aunt made their way out of the room. As they flicked the lights off, the darkness consumed me. I watched as the world around me had gone dark and blank, just as how I had felt inside. Our quiet sniffles echoed throughout the walls of my cousins bedroom, as we each laid awake contemplating what would happen to Grandma next. While making my way across the floor in the funeral parlor, I examine the pictures arranged that lay across the dark, wooden table. My grandma’s smile is what stood out in each and every picture. My favorite picture of her was of the one of her at my sixth grade winter concert. Although many of the parents there were miserable listening to the pitchy and irritating singing of a group adolescent children, she still managed to have a smile on her face. She always did. As I slowly place the picture frame back on the table, I do my best to hold back the tears. Nothing in life was as painful as seeing a her suffer. Just a few months ago, I creeped into my grandmas living room, and found her lying helplessly on her couch. Her body frail, but her heart strong. I remember I was hesitant at first to go over. My grandma was one of the strongest
people I knew, but to see her suffering and vulnerable was heartbreaking. My mom nodded me over, and I slowly made my way towards her. She reached her arm up for me to hold her hand. Although she was shaking uncontrollably, I grasped her frail hand and interlaced it in my own. I could feel the tears forming in my eyes, but I couldn’t show it; I had to be strong for her. My feelings after that day were ambivalent. I couldn’t bring myself to accept the thought of her possible dying in the near future. I wanted her to be alive and I wanted to be able to see her, but that was selfish of me. Everyday that she was alive meant that something inside of her was dying. Thinking about how much pain she enured day in and day out often made me wish that she could be freed of her suffering. My cousins and I all agree that we could use a break. Making our way out of the stuffy down the softly carpeted staircase, we enter the kids room to find my youngest cousin Evan playing with tiny, toy trains. I can’t help but feel envious over his innocence. It’s not fair that he doesn’t have to bear the same grief as the rest of us do. I think back to when my mom told my brother and I that grandma had passed away. The mood seemed awfully depressing and I had a dreadful feeling in my gut . My mom made her way over to my brother and I looking fraught with sorrow. “I have some bad news” my mom uttered as she grabbed ahold of our hands. Her hands were trembling and ice cold, yet the provided enough warmth and comfort we had needed. “Grandma passed away earlier today” she continued. As the words came out of her mouth, the the world around me was suddenly shaking like an earthquake. My vision became blurry and my head dizzy. It felt as the ground below me had just ripped apart, and I fell into a massive whole. I felt like I was falling and falling but there was no bottom. There has been no end to the pain I felt ever since the moment I heard those words. I have relived that
moment over and over since when I first found out earlier this week. “Grandma passed away” replay and replay in my head like a broken record. But my parents were there to pick me up and comfort me when I needed them the most. My mom sat me that day and told me, “We’re here for you. We will always be here for you no matter what.” My parents had given me the fortitude I needed to make it through the past few days, that’s why it’s so important I do the same for my mom now. I could not leave her feeling bereft. I sorrowfully make my way over to the soft rounded chairs that sit lonely in the middle of the floor. While wrapping my arms around her, I whisper in her ear that “I love you, and I know that grandma loved us very much. She’s in a better place now.” The tears pour out of her eyes like a waterfall as she gently rests her head upon my shoulder, and I can’t help but cry too. My dad grabs my hands and places it in my own as we make our way over to my grandma to say goodbye. There is a painful, aching pressure squeezing in heart as a peer over the casket to see my grandma’s face one last time. Sometimes life really sucks. It’s not fair that the good people always die. My grandma once had so much light and happiness in her heart, but cancer took it away. And now cancer took her life. I had spent so much time being mad and upset at the world for taking her away from me, but as take a good look at her lifeless body for the last time, I now realize I can’t change any of it. She truly is in a better place now. No matter how hard it may be, I must finally accept that although she’ll always be in my heart, she is gone. The only thing I can do now is kiss her and say goodbye one last time.