Jul. 08, 2004 - 20:02 MDT

THE WONDERING JEW

Still Here ?

A lady near a year younger than I am, who suffered greatly with rheumatoid arthritis and osteoporosis died on July 4, 2004.

A cousin of mine who was as near a sister I would ever have in blood relatives. A companion in board games, cards and the many puzzles they had, she was also a participator in some of the things her brother and I got into. I remember one Halloween party we went to, she in a spiffy costume and me in, I guess what they call "drag" today. She used to ride her bike across town to see me, we ice skated in the winter on Washington Park North Lake in the winter.

Her brother, a few months older than I, but not so much, often would be off playing with his friends, but Alice and I would amuse ourselves with something or other. In the evenings when my folks brought me to visit, Alice and I hung close together, stood next to each other around the piano while they drowned out my off key singing -- but we had fun.

I remember after dinner over there, she, her two sisters, her brother and I would all do the dishes and put them away. And I had fun doing it, gabbing, teasing, but doing the work all along. My Mom puzzled about why I liked to do dishes with my cousins, I don't think she understood that working with friends was so much better than doing dishes alone.

Then the better part of a year I would get on the street car and ride across town to her place. I had chorea (they called it St. Vitus Dance then) and Mom and Dad wanted me over there while they worked. A succession of pills powders and special diet overseen by auntie. All summer I was over there with my cousins the whole day and spent a good amount of time with my young cousins after they got home from school later on.

Alice got married to her high school sweetheart long before Heather I did but our kids were close together in age even so.

She and her husband were somewhere in the Caribbean, Puerto Rico perhaps, where he was in the military. Heather and I were 10 years in Florida and even when we were in the same town later our nuclear families kept us busy most of the time, once in a while we could visit but not as often as we liked. Heather loved Alice, they had much in common.

Still there was a closeness between us that was not easy to duplicate -- too much history, it was.

In recent years she was mostly a captive in her home, her kids would come over to do work around her house and yard and take her to the store. Her visits to the hospital for operations helped her a bit, but she was in pain a good deal of the time evenso.

Heather and I were trying to get over and visit her at her home after her last surgery and stay in the rehab place. It comes to my mind that Heather and I will have to get over to see her brother a bit more often now. He is in bad health and hobbling along about like me.

I will carry the usual load of guilt because we didn't somehow get over to visit her. She died July 4th, Heather and one daughter and grandson were in Las Vegas from the fifth 'til last night, her brother called me after Heather had gone. It was a trip that Rob and the gals were going to take when he got better and the ladies still really needed some getaway time. Things all run in together, he died the 31 of May and things were still up in the air over his death for most of the month. A full plate while keeping others spinning interferes with sociability to the max, what with birthdays, anniversaries, births, surgeries and deaths, etc.

We will grieve her going, yet realizing that she has no more pain and discomfort, we do regret that we did not get over to see her before she embarked on her last journey. Her Memorial Service will be tomorrow at three PM.

Seems like Heather and I are still on the pier waving goodbye to our peers and the few of our elders that are still with us and it is getting a bit lonesome now as the crowd thins. We live with what we have and keep trying to rise above grief, I think we will make it, someday. Makes me wonder though, after all the years of abusing my body, why am I Still Here ? . . . . . . . . .

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