Life and Death

As soon as we drove into the parking lot at rehab, Smitty, our favorite valet guy, opened Jeannie's door, greeted her then gave her a big "welcome back" hug. That was only the beginning. Every person who came to the lobby to wait for the class to start hugged her and said that they had missed her. She was overwhelmed with the outpouring of love and support.

She is jumping through the hoops to access the assisted suicide program here in California, which is via pills. We talked about it and she is also researching surrounding herself so the death itself would be based spiritually. Going home to heaven. These are hard conversations and I am learning a lot.

After I had my mammogram and donated four vials of blood for the Strive research program regarding breast cancer, I made my way to the rehab class. It was almost over so I didn't workout. Instead, I waited for Jeannie to finish. Our friend Janet was working out just behind me and she began to tell me a story.

We knew her husband had been having heart problems, they discovered Monday that he needed open-heart surgery. Later, he told her he was not going though with it, making the comment that he was ready to die instead. Janet started to cry while telling me the story. I spoke carefully. He was frightened. He was depressed.

Janet was just angry as she has been fighting for every single day and should have been gone long ago. I tried to change the anger into understanding. Talk to him about how important he is to their granddaughter, who they see a lot. She adores him. Talk to him about how it might feel when he is actually facing impending death that he may regret not having the surgery. Talk to him about feeling venerable and that was it was okay to be scared. Talk to him about getting all the facts from the doctor before making the decision.

She felt better with a plan of action as they meet with the doctor again this morning. I hope the anger is gone so they can talk. Really talk.

Then, last evening the doorbell rang. It was our former neighbor who moved from Leslie's house in 2000. He and his daughter traveled yesterday from Atlanta to spread his wife's ashes in the ocean across the street from us. She had died suddenly in July. She was lovely and left two children and two grandchildren. The youngest daughter was with her dad to help with the ceremony. We handed out heavy jackets, scarfs and flashlights as they expected the weather to be hot, like the rest of the state. They returned an hour later, having face-timed with the other daughter in Atlanta. The sweet Annie needed a good hug and we stood for awhile just holding each other. They thanked us and took off.

What a perfect ending to this extraordinary day.