When my mother-in-law passed away, her two sons were by her side, along with my precious niece and me. It was a long miserable night of morphine and labored breathing and careful observation of a soul lingering in a worn out mind and body until… until what? I don’t know. Nor do you. What happens beyond the science, that calls a person at just that precise moment to vacate the earthly shell inhabited for so many years? To finally spiritually abandon the worn out body, brain, and mind so inextricably intertwined?
It was an extraordinary and tremendously difficult moment to witness- that instant when another human being drew her final breath. Final. The end. There was to be no other. An immediate stunning silence followed.
I’m not sure how it happened but my niece and I suddenly found ourselves alone in the room. I climbed onto the bed beside my mother-in-law and held her. I stroked her furrowed brow, something I would never have felt comfortable doing when she was in her body. She was most independent and certainly not demonstrative with her affection. My niece watched this thoughtfully and kept her notions of it to herself.
My petite spirited niece who is herself healthily independent, is on the quiet side until she warms up to people and generally optimistic. As we made our way to the parking lot together, she looked to me and volunteered that she could now check this off her bucket list. This was on your bucket list, I inquired to be sure I had heard correctly. Yes, she said, to watch someone die was on her list. I mused a moment. Well, she is entering the military, and she could one day find herself on a battlefield… and in all of two seconds her reasoning was decided.
On the drive home, it occurred to me that I didn’t even have a bucket list. This young woman less than half my age not only had a bucket list but had successfully managed to check something off of it! Though this seemed of some mild importance, on that memorable day I had no further time to devote to the subject.
Today, it has been nearly two years since and recently it occurred to me that I still hadn’t assembled that bucket list. It is now or never.
Bucket List:
Item one- Stand in Poetry, Texas on some lovely day, at what was originally known as Turner’s Point and breathe deeply, purposefully, and appreciatively.
Copyright 2017. L.L. Shelton.