Death and his touch

In my circle of friends, many of them have come in contact with death. Of course everybody comes into contact with it eventually, since death is part of life. Without death, what would life be? We wouldn't be able to appreciate the life that we have. If I ever had the choice between a mortal or an immortal life without the possibility of dying, I'd pick the mortal life. Of course I'm curious about the future, but without a deadline for life, there would be no motivation.

Lately I've heard stories of people I know losing a family member, which made me start wondering about my own life. A cousin of mine lives in a small house with her daughter, her boyfriend, and her sister, and she has taken in our grandmother and her live-in-caretaker. My grandmother is not well. She is diabetic, anaemic, with kidney failure and since last week she also has a broken arm. Seeing her like this makes me think about how her life used to be.

My grandmother's life was not easy. This woman was married to a man I did not know well, and she bore him five children. It is now more than ten years since he died, and she still lives on. Of her five children she only has regular contact with her eldest son and her youngest daughter, my uncle and my mom. How this happened, I do not know. My grandmother and grandfather weren't rich, but they were rather wealthy. They had a maid, a big house with two stories, and their eldest son lived with them with his wife and four children. On a living room wall hung several pictures, my grandparents in their younger days and their parents. The wall of the staircase showed the university degrees their grandchildren had. I only remember my grandfather being scary, sitting in his big bed in the master bedroom, ordering people around. It's my only memory of him.

I remember the days that I'd sit with my grandmother and played card games with her. And how I was always told to run upstairs to her bedroom at night and tell her it was dangerous to smoke in bed. She has this green massage chair that I loved to sit in and pretend to be important, even though I were still far too small for it. (Nowadays I'm bigger than her, and it still doesn't get all the spots...) We used to watch telly together in her room at night when I was actually supposed to sleep, or I'd watch her cook her delicious food in the big kitchen.

I have always been amazed at the fact that she and my uncle would get up early in the morning to buy fantastic breakfast home for the rest of the family. They'd always be packed up in brown paper that could stand the oil, and it would be kept together with a red rubber band. I can still remember how they smelled and tasted. My grandmother loves certain foods which she cannot eat any longer due to her diabetes. She still does it sometimes, like a naughty little child. And she loves to give me money that I'd have to deny, because my mom would never let me. But of course then she'd still sneakily pass it to me, just because she could.

"Take it! Just take it already! Your mom doesn't have to know, just take it. I want to give it to you, I'm your grandmother! Go treat yourself to something nice, consider it a birthday present from me. Or a Christmas present. Perhaps a New Years present. Just because I haven't seen you in a while. I don't need it, you just use it. I have money, but what am I going to spend it on? So you just take it and use it. TAKE IT."

Yes, my grandmother was very persuasive. It didn't matter how much I struggled, I'd always end up with the money in my pocket. I love my grandmother, even though I don't talk to her much.

She has been in and out of the hospital lately, and I'm wondering how she feels about this. She's a fighter, but I often wonder how long she still has, and whether it would be better for her if death came soon. Is that a bad thing to think? I guess this is one of the things I ponder about at night when in bed, leaving me awake until 6 am.




She squeezed how many bowling balls out???