My Dear Grandma

Wasn't she beautiful?

It has been a very sad time losing my last grandparent. Grandma was a wonderful lady….so full of life; an absolute spit-fire.  She really told people how she felt about everything and anything!  Never get her going on George W. Bush....that's for sure!  It’s too bad her last days had to be spent at a place she didn’t care for.  After her passing, I went to the nursing home to help gather her belongings, and I just thought to myself, “What a depressing place.”  It’s not because that’s usually the last place people go before their final resting home, but it's the environment that they have to do so in.  So dull and boring; not colorful; not exciting; no homey-feel to it.  The walls in her rooms were painted white bricks (made me wonder if that’s what it would feel like in prison).  Her shared bathroom didn’t even have a vent to help air out the room.  During one of my visits, I thought this should have been a necessity in a nursing home.  It was heartbreaking to know that these people have lived and worked all of their lives and now have succumbed to this kind of living. Grandma made comments like “No one ever comes to see me”, but that wasn’t true.  It just felt like an eternity, from one visit to the next, because she wasn’t accustomed to being so secluded and bored.  To me, she’ll always be the 96 year old grandma who was still taking weekly trips across the country in a semi truck with my dad.  She was 96 and still living in her own apartment, so moving to a nursing home was quite a blow to her independence.  I am certain my grandma is much happier where she is at now… I have to believe that. 

 Celebrating her birthday in 2005.

 Grandma and I at her 90th birthday party. 

"Oh, you shouldn't have" were some of her most used words.

This was a surprise visit to her place in Prentice.  She sure loved seeing Carter that day.

Picture taken on 8-1-2011, a couple weeks before she went into the nursing home.

She loved our picnics at Mondeaux Dam. 

 She loved it when we were all together.

Grandma and my dad laughing...most likely because of something goofy my dad said.  :-)

He could always make her smile.

I searched for a poem that would help describe my grandma's life, but most just didn't fit.  Either they were too sappy, or too personalized to someone else's situation.  My grandma lived a very long and fulfilled life, so I can't say that this wasn't expected.  I just never thought the day would actually come. 

I thought of you with love today, but that's nothing new.  I thought of you yesterday and the day before that too.  I often speak your name.  Now all I have are the memories and a picture in a frame.  Your memory is my keepsake with which I'll never part.  God has you in his keeping and I have you in my heart. ~Author Unknown

Lillian DuBois

APR 30, 1914 - MAR 11, 2011