lily of the valley: Silent Strength [Guest Entry #3: by Canela]

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(age: 24 years, 10 months, 26 days, 17 hours, 39 minutes)
[history: 2005... 2003... 1999... 1990... 1988... ]

Sunday October 20, 2002

Silent Strength [Guest Entry #3: by Canela]

I woke up to the phone ringing. Before anyone had the chance to say anything, I already knew.

About four years before, my grandmother had what she thought was a bad case of bronchitis. With tests they soon realized that she actually had a cancerous tumor in her lung. The tumor originated from reoccurring cancer cells. She fought breast cancer about 20 years prior. The doctors decided against doing surgery, and to fight the tumor with radiation. Unfortunately, the cancer spread to her liver. In the fall of my eighth grade year, my grandmother began undergoing chemotherapy.

As the treatments increased, my grandmother, who was already very thin, began to get very sick. The chemo made her feel very nauseated as well as weak. In December, my grandmother's weakness and nausea only increased. The Christmas holiday was near. As usual we would have Christmas dinner at my grandparent's house. We all brought and made the food so that they wouldn't have to make any of the preparations. Both of my parents and my sister had come down with a fairly bad cold. So, for the gathering, they wore medical masks, since my grandmother was too ill to be exposed to their sickness.

My grandmother had not eaten much and we could tell she was tired, so we all left quickly. I'll never forget, as we were leaving, we all went to say good-bye to my grandmother who was sitting on the couch. When I said good-bye she told me that she loved me and I merely said, "have a good Christmas."

At that point in my life I wasn't very comfortable with affection. I really regret not telling my grandmother that I loved her.

Shortly after Christmas my grandmother had become increasingly ill and had to stay in the hospital. On the evening of January 13th my parents and I had decided that we were going to go visit her, in the hospital, the next morning, due to heavy schedules that day.

That morning, around six, I was laying in bed when the phone rang. I had a weird feeling in my stomach. I got up to go to the bathroom, avoiding any contact with my parents, because I was afraid of what they would tell me. When I came out of the bathroom my parents informed me that my grandmother had died early that morning. I didn't know what to think. I started crying and I really didn't want to believe it was true.

Throughout the school year I had been involved in a production of Grease, which was set to perform on January 14th, the same day I had been informed that my grandmother had died.

I stayed home most of the morning. When I went to school, around lunchtime, everyone could tell that I had been crying. The rest of the day was a complete haze. I was extremely upset. However, I had a large part in the play and I knew that I had to perform. It was really hard for me to forget about the circumstances, but throughout the performance I felt as though my grandmother was watching me.

Through this experience I realized how much some people have to go through in their lives. My grandparents had been married for over forty years; they did everything together. My mother said that when she went to see how my grandfather was doing, the morning my grandmother died, he was already working on cleaning the house and throwing away thousands of dollars worth of medicine. I realized what a strong person my grandfather is. That evening he came to watch my performance, which must have taken a lot of strength. That is something my grandmother would have done. She never missed any of her grandchildren's important events. Since then my grandfather has retired, remarried, and moved to Chicago. He's changed a lot about himself, but I think it was something he had to do in order to get over his wife's death.

written for Ms. Noteboom's Writing 121 class: Autobiographical Incident

scribbled by nela @ 19:24:00

this has been a family, school days, serious life, theatre entry