RIP Maria Palmhed
My grandmother passed away last night. It still feels unreal. At 12:23 my mother received the call. She had gone in her sleep, two days after her seventh heart infarct, after her kidneys stopped processing liquid and she at times seemed unreachable in a haze of morphine and antibiotics. She listened to phone-calls but couldn't/wouldn't respond to most of them.
The last two or three years she's been getting weaker and weaker, mentally too, I guess. She stopped walking completely as of late, spent days in bed, relied on morphine band-aids to ease what I've thought was muscle pain due to lack of usage, but what was just recently revealed as myositis.
I wonder how her sister will take this. My grandmother reached an admirable age of 92 years. She'd have been 93 on the fourth of July this year, and yet her sister is 97. They've both been widows for a long time, almost as long as I've lived, and they've had their own houses not even a kilometer apart, in the town they were both born in: Kangosfors. Through difficult times they've taken care of each other, if only by speaking on the phone.
The last I spoke to grandma was around three weeks ago. Me and my sister recorded a Christmas album with five songs (the last one with one custom verse and message), and it was a hit, it was the most popular present of the year. Maybe the most popular present for many years to come... is what I thought. With all the Christmas stress that's customary during that time of the year we almost didn't make it, we kept stalling, then finally we took the train in to record the day before the album was sent out, and my sister/her friend the producer stayed up till four recording & polishing the rest of the tracklist. Thank god that we finished that album! At the time it didn't seem like Christmas would be any different than usual, 'cept for the lack of snow, but as it turns out this was her last Christmas. In retrospect it feels like a gift of farewell as well.
My grandma was a strong woman. She could be angry and gruff and say things that people didn't like to hear, but she was kind at heart... at least to us grandchildren. Over the years it seems she became all the kinder, maybe because she became reliant on the people around her, but she never did loose that sparky temperament, that anger that I believe is what at many times kept her going; kept her alive.
Over the years she's told plenty of tales, of when she grew up, of how life was back then.. but I can't seem to recall enough to write one down. I can't seem to tell the stories in English either. Do I regret not asking more? Do I regret not calling her in her final moments, after her kidneys stopped processing liquid and the doctors predicted she didn't have long left to live? I think the one thing I do regret is not accomplishing a career before she passed, of finding my purpose. She's always wondered what I'd do with my life; urged me to take the steps: get a job, do something, earn money. This year I will take those steps.
In her time, work was equal to survival, she and grandpa worked day and night, outside during the day, inside during the night. They picked berries, hunted, fished, plotted land, sold potatoes, milked the cows, helped villagers with paperwork, took courses, held seminars on topics like flower arrangement, managed the village shop and stayed afloat doing everything they could do or learn to do. They both learned how to craft with roots of birch and pine (which she has during later years held courses in) and have made an amazing amount of durable and beautiful advent stars, underlays, trays, earrings and all types of paraphernalia. They were both amazing people, but my grandpa died when I was four so I only have vague memories of him. Of grandma however, my mind is full of memories.
My eyes are tearing now, but that's because I'm tired. It's almost one now and I should go to sleep. It feels wrong to sleep, somehow. Or at least it feels wrong to fall asleep with ease. I think I'll shut my eyes and say a silent farewell, recall the best memories I can, and tomorrow... I'll post this. It's business as usual, right? How are you supposed to act in stations like this. Do grandchildren get a grieving period, or is that only applicable for the next of kin? For now, for the world, Rest in Peace - Maria Palmhed - 1921-2014. You will be remembered, your memory cherished, your personality missed and your life a story to be told.
Yesterday, when I wrote the above, I was in a rather apathetic state of mind. Am I holding back emotion or am I in a state of apathy because there is such a distance between us, a hundred miles at least, and I haven't seen her in months, I thought. I wondered how I'll feel next summer, when we visit her house. I wondered who will take care of it. But there's bound to be a funeral before that. I wondered how I'll feel then? I thought those things then, but today it's at times a bit of a struggle to keep emotion at bay. I wrote a song yesterday, I wrote another this morning; I'm writing this memento to share the memory and the moment.
This is probably the most personal blog post you'll ever read here. :) RIP! Your body was left behind, but you'll live on in our minds!
