Letters

Today I wrote about the last week of my mom's life.

I had lived through it, and talked about it with people, but I hadn't written it down and something kept telling me, "Write it down or you'll forget something." So I did. I typed for four pages--single space--and I cried some. But it was done. Then I printed it out and I folded it up and put it in an envelope.

I told my dad that I did this.

"What are you going to do with it?" he asked.

"I put it in my 'Mom's funeral bag'," I replied. That is a bag I received with some goodies in it from a friend and I put all the cards and notes and letters I got from people about my mom in it and then I put in the pictures that I printed out from the funeral, and now it holds the story of the last week.

Oh, and a letter I wrote to Stephenie Meyer, the author of the Twilight books. You see, she helped my mom, too, only she didn't know it and I thought she should.

So I wrote to her, too, and printed a copy to mail and a copy for me. To put in the bag.

So I will always remember.

Spirit of Elijah

I have been bit by the geneaology bug...bad.

It got me for the first time last summer. I spent weeks and weeks sorting through info from my grandmas and organizing it in my new computer program and then I joined ancestry.com and found two different family lines previously unknown that went back 4 generations. It was incredible.

Then, it was time for school to start and I had to set it all aside.

These past weeks, the symptoms hit again and I have been at it with vengeance. I even looked into getting a second bachelor's degree in Family History. Can you believe BYU won't let you get two bachelor's degrees? Bummer.

I have always suspected I'd be a family history junkie. I love to organize and put things in their proper order; and I LOVE my family. But it was never the right season of life, you know? I was having babies and working full-time and I just couldn't give it what it needed. But I thought it might be something I could get into. I was right. I cannot get enough.

This past week I am sorting through the Bass and Hogg families. I can still hear my Nana's voice talking to me about them and telling me she just couldn't get them straightened out and that I would have to do it.

Nana, I am happy to do so.

Passing

My mom passed away last week.

Often, it seems surreal. Could this have happened to me? to my family? to my mom?

My mind keeps fixing on certain moments: her hand clasping mine so tightly in the ER just days before she died. Her last breaths when all I could do was kneel by her side and sob and say "Mom" over and over. How she looked reclining in the front seat of my car while we looked at the fall leaves in Provo Canyon and felt the cool breeze.

People ask me how it was. Hard.

People ask me how I am. OK.

The law of opposition is so at work here. It is good that she is no longer suffering. It is sad that we can't see her anymore. I am glad to be home and caring for my children. I worry about my dad and wish I was there to help him.

Last night, we read the letters my mom had written to each of us. They were all so personal and so filled with love. I told my kids, "I know that Grandma still lives, because this much love doesn't just go away."