A week of remembering.

There are some times of each year that you just know will be shitty. This particular week is one of them. In various years, three of the most important people to ever touch my life all passed away. Add pregnancy hormones and an absent husband and you have one hell of a craptastic week.

The first 5 years of my life, I lived and breathed for my great grandmother, Mom's grandmother. My mom was back in college, and I'd stay with my Nonnie every day when Mom went to class. We had a very special relationship. Even at 5 years old, I knew this. I remember the day she died. I remember where I was (Mamaw's house) and what I was wearing when my parents told me, or rather, when my Daddy told me. My mother couldn't quite speak, if I recall correctly. Nonnie had been her one and only constant during her childhood. We both struggled when she died. I still vividly remember all things surrounding her death on February 10, including her funeral a few days later, again, including what I wore. I wasn't sure what death was at the age of 5, but I knew enough to know my Nonnie was gone.

In 2005, I lost my Mamaw. My Dad's mom was the strongest woman I've ever known. Being the only granddaughter, she and I were special together. I was the one who drove her around, took her shopping (and to Burger King for fish sandwiches and vanilla malts), tilled her garden, learned her recipes, looked at her pictures, balanced her checkbook, learned the family stories, called her almost daily, and was the one she told when she was ready to finally go to the hospital when she was dying. She had a not so very long battle with ovarian cancer, and when she decided she was ready to go, she went. Her death is still the most peaceful event I've ever experienced. Myself, along with all my relatives, cousins, aunts, uncles were in the ICU cubicle when she died. Her breathing and heart rate slowed, and we all thought she was gone. Then she perked back up for a minute, enough for a cousin to comment that clearly heaven wasn't perfectly ready for her yet and she was waiting for them to sweep the floor again. A few minutes later, she was gone. We were all there with her when she took her last breath. It was peaceful and perfect, if you can describe a death as perfect, on February 13. I can tell you from experience, flower shops are not prepared to deal with grieving people picking out funeral flowers on Valentine's Day. But that's what my aunt and I did that day. And yes, it sucked as much as you can imagine.

Through both of those deaths, my Aunt Hazy had been there for me. She was Nonnie's daughter and roommate and had been an important part of mine and Mom's lives. She'd never had any children and made Mom and her own. She spoiled us both, not with money or stuff, but with love, homemade fudge, and amazing margaritas. She was the person that we could both go to for advice, or venting, or anything really. She was a sharp tongued, tell it like it is, smart ass who smoked like a chimney and rarely kept her thoughts to herself. In short, mine and Mom's hero. When she died on February 8, my world was totally shaken. During her wake and funeral, almost everyone there came up to me and told me what an important role I'd had in Sara's life, how she never missed an opportunity to talk about me and what I was doing at that point in life. I knew she had played a huge role in my life, but I never considered the role I'd played in hers. It made the hole she left even bigger, a hole that is still very much there.


I'm so ready for Bob to be home, but his trip back home keeps getting cancelled. He's been told the significance of this week in the past, but I haven't reminded him this year, and he hasn't been at home to see my sadness. This year, it's been my own sad struggle alone, which is okay. It has made me even more ready for my little guy to be here. I need someone to hug and snuggle with, besides Hank, who has had the most epic flatulence this week. Thanks, bud.... as if I needed another reason to make my eyes water.

Part of my heart.

I'm typically a pretty sentimental person. I cherish my family and the relationships I've built. Some very important people in my life are no longer here. My Mamaw, my great Aunt Sara, otherwise known as Hazy, and my great grandmother, Grandma. There are others, but these three have recently, within in the last 10 years, passed away.

Oh how I wish they were still here. I want to so much to pick up the phone and call my Mamaw, talk to her about having a baby, to get her advice, to go pick her up and take her to dinner. I'd like to go to my Hazy's house, with a pizza and cheese dip in hand, and talk about the rest of our family and how I'll need to make sure I raise our kid to be normal, unlike the rest of the family. And I'd like to be able to take our child up to Grandma's farm so he/she will learn all about animals and the responsibility of a farm, just as I did as a child.

I miss these women an incredible amount. Earlier this week, one of the residents at my facility started singing Mamaw's favorite hymn. Just to hear that song, I immediately started crying. She, along with Hazy and Grandma, were so important in my life, and they still are. They would be so proud of the marriage that Bob and I have and the life we've built. They would be ecstatic over the baby. I mean, ridiculously ecstatic. Mamaw would teach baby all the Bible stories and how to properly till a garden. Hazy would teach baby all the good cuss words and how to make a mean margarita. And Grandma would teach baby about how to raise chickens and how to make an killer wedding cake. These are some of the things I learned from these amazing ladies. Things that are now my responsibility to pass on to baby. I can't wait to share these things with our kids. They will know all about the important people these lessons came from and how awesome they were!

Sadie Green.

So. My most favorite-est great aunt's name was Sara Green. She never had children, so my Mom kinda became her surrogate child since my grandparents worked non-stop 24/7. When I came along, naturally I became her baby too. I really can't put into words what she meant to me. She was just the perfect aunt.

When I was growing up, her house was just magical. She had a wall of all our photographs, from her great-grandparents down to me and BL, all her siblings, all their kids, all the cousins, everyone, and most in black and white. She also hung lots of random things, one of which was sheet music from the song Sadie Green: The Vamp of New Orleans. It's not the most flattering song in the world, but it was special. One of her nicknames was Sadie, she adored New Orleans, and it fit her wild child personality pretty well.

Anyway. When she passed away, one of my great uncles snagged it off her wall before I could get there. I've been searching for this sheet music for YEARS, specifically since she passed away in 2007. And tonight, I WON IT ON EBAY! Omg.

I can't wait to mat and frame it and hang it our new house!!