The seasons of life: one passes, another grows

This week was up and down.

We received one of those late night phone calls a couple weeks ago. Prepare yourself, my father-in-law told my husband, could be any time now. Then last Saturday the second, expected, call came. My husband's grandpa had died. We pulled out a book recommended by Sonlight P3/4 "Nana Upstairs and Nana Downstairs", read, and discussed it. We answered any questions 3.5 yr old T had about his Papaw's death. Questions like, "Does God see my papaw right now?"

The next day was Sunday. We left after church and arrived at my husband's maternal grandmother's place just in time for supper (fried chicken and cheetos. Not my norm by any extent). The next couple days were extremely busy. I tried to keep some semblance of normal for T. We did a few preschool type activities on Monday. Tuesday was spent with family and at the funeral. When we got up, we found my inlaws had left for my mother-in-law's mom's home already. We scrambled to iron clothes, feed ourselves, and make sure a change of clothes and a busy bag was prepared for T. We got to my husband's mamaw's place, waited for more family to arrive, then all trooped over to the funeral home for family visitation.

T asked to be picked upas the family filed in through the dimly lit room. It was rather different from the come and go visitation for my own Grandma's funeral, just a few days shy of three years before. T looked at the still, empty body of great-Papaw lying in the open casket. Mamaw cried. T said, "That's Papaw's empty body. His soul left it and went to God, right?" Then he snuggled up to Nana and her mom, great- Mamaw, to comfort them.

He did pretty well for the rest of the long, long day. The service itself was a bit long for a little one. At one point I almost took him out because he got pretty restless. He recovered though. When we were at the cemetery an 11 year old cousin shrieked "Eww! We're walking over dead bodies!" She hurried away towards the pavement. T looked at her, astonished. "No we aren't," he said as he hurried after, "We're walking over earthworms!"

The next day, late, we loaded up the car and drove the long road home only to wake early this morning. It was worth it though. In the midst of thinking about death the whole family was also thinking about life, and looking forward to this morning. "Be sure to call me right away!" my mother-in-law said. When I asked if she wouldn't rather find out at our next visit, well, let's say that didn't go over all that well. You've probably long guessed. This took a long time to get one to stick. We finally have a sticky bean, and we've made it half way! After the ultrasound I took T to Buy Buy Baby where I let him pick a gift for baby. He was most particular about what to buy.