My grandmother's death

A high school reflection on gratitude and grief

I wrote my college application essay about what my relationship with my grandmother meant to me and what it was like to spend time caring for her in the last days of her life. I sat for hours in the school library typing this essay, tears streaming down my face as I tried to describe what it felt like to be so grateful and so grief-stricken at the same time. This essay is an artifact of my 17-year-old heart and mind and a testament to what my grandmother Marjorie meant to me in both life and death.

My Grandmother’s Death

November 2003

A lot of things happened the summer before my senior year of high school. I started driving, my mother remarried, I opened my first checking account, and my mother spent eight weeks in New Mexico while I stayed home with my stepfather and worked at a convenience store. But the most important part of this summer was that I was going to spend it with my grandmother. And then, eight days into vacation, my grandmother became ill with pneumonia. Nine days later, she passed away.

In society today, it seems that death, especially of older relatives, is met with grief over missed opportunities. We often wish that the relative in question had lived just one last week, one final day, so that we could take the opportunity to say “I love you,” or “You mean the world to me.” I was fortunate. My relationship with my grandmother was never like that. 

I spent the summer before seventh grade with my grandparents in Kingston, NY. That summer, I learned many things from my grandmother. I learned the correct order in which to iron the different parts of a man’s shirt, how to fold a fitted sheet so that it doesn’t wrinkle, and how to make smooth gravy without the awful white lumps. But more than that, I learned the true meaning of respecting your elders. My grandmother was a very small person. In her younger years she always prided herself on her twenty-five-inch waist and stature of exactly five feet and three quarter inches. She was active in any conversation topic that came up. Even if she had no previous knowledge or experience with what was being discussed, her canned response was always, “I know.” 

The grandmother I knew looked nothing like this. She was gray, wrinkled and stooped over from years of poor posture and not enough calcium. But she still carried with her the air of authority and control that I grew to love and admire, she still seemed to be in the know about anything that came her way and she still spoke as though she expected her listeners to take her seriously. Even when her macular degeneration gradually lessened her ability to see to that of mere contour, she still moved about her house with confidence and grace, sure of the place of everything she owned. 

 That summer, because my grandmother was blind, I read her my favorite books, and she in turn told me of her adventures as a Communist spy in Europe. As I learned of her travels with my grandfather and eventual imprisonment in a convent in France, she too learned of the intricacies of the world of Hogwart’s. We did crossword puzzles together as I read her the clues and told her the number of open spaces. And more than anything, we talked – about the news, her most recent book on tape, and our lives, both where they had gone and where they would go. After that summer, I only saw my grandmother during vacations or on an occasional weekend. But each time, we would talk as though not a minute had passed since our last meeting. 

I had a feeling that this past summer would be my grandmother’s last, even before it began. After my grandfather’s passing six months before, my grandmother lost her will to live. It was only a matter of time. I knew it was important that I take this last opportunity to show my grandmother how much I truly cared about her. And then, two days before my mother’s scheduled date of departure for New Mexico, my grandmother was hospitalized. My mother left as scheduled. In the last days of my grandmother’s life, I fed her meals to her, brushed her teeth, and cleaned her dentures. I knew that she was more comfortable being cared for by me than by a nurse and I helped the nurses understand her needs and wants. And as always, we talked, though much more slowly and quietly than we had in the past.

In our last conversation, we exchanged words more direct and meaningful than any we had shared before.

“Grandma, I know you’re tired, but are you listening?” She nodded.

“I hope you know that I love you dearly. And… you’ve influenced me more than anyone else in my life. And I’m so glad that you’ve had the opportunity to have such a strong impact on me.”

“I know … me too.” She paused for a minute, seemingly trying to catch her breathe, to gather her thoughts for one last connection. I waited and at last she spoke. 

“I’m glad I knew you.” 

In the last hours before her death, I decided that I had had enough. I kissed my grandmother gently on the cheek and went to sit and wait in the visitors’ lounge. In the early hours of morning, I sat on the cold plastic sofa taking in the distinctive hospital aroma of sterilized metal and name-brand cleaning solution, cementing the moment in my mind. Images of my grandmother and me playing checkers, making pies, ironing shirts, and stirring gravy flashed through my mind. I realized that this was it, the end. And at the same time I realized that that was okay. Overcome with nostalgia, I began to cry. But I did not cry tears of lost opportunity. I cried tears of happiness. I realized that, though I was sad to lose my grandmother, her passing, as well as the rest of my lifelong relationship with her, had been the best that it possibly could have been. 

As odd as it may sound, it’s probably accurate to say that the best part of this summer was my grandmother’s death. It was sudden and fast, the way she wanted it. And I was able to spend almost every minute of the last days of her life by her side. But the best part of all is that I have no regrets.

Marjorie, 85, and her second husband, Jimmy, in 1996.