God. grumpa. life.

'jade smile. you are very beautiful when you smile.' wait a second as i smile for him. first a cheesy grin, then i'm scared into a real smile after he glares at me. 'there. you aren't even half as pretty when you are frowning.'

it's not that i'm an ill-content person. my face just looks naturally pissed off unless i'm smiling.
but grandpa did that to you. he made you smile--whether that was scaring you to the point where the options were down to: a) smiling and b) bursting into tears, or being so darn cute that you couldn't help it but smile at him, cracking a joke, making fun of your father, telling you you're beautiful, smart, charming...ok so basically grumpa made me smile with just about everything he did.

i knew he was sick. he knew this time it would kill him. but....i just didn't expect it that day. i was texting my mom while i was at work, and she was informing me that grumpa (called so because we often compared him to grumpy the dwarf...and because the great grandchildren couldn't seem to pronounce grandpa...so grumpa came out) was a very sick man--yeah, i knew that--and that i should try to visit when i got off work. this, i was planning to do. but when mom said that i should try to get there asap... as in, leave early... i balked a little. that would require leaving the girl i was working with alone to close up shop. and really, what was two more hours? grandpa had been sick for days. for years. he would be ok. he was always ok.
then she said that doc told them grumpa had hours. mere. hours. you better bet that i barely even said goodbye to the girl i was working with. i was out of there.

i was already crying by the time i got to the hospital. that's how big of a baby i am. the orderlies didn't stop me--i came rushing down the hall, and they must have been able to tell from my horror-struck face that i was with the jensens, so they let me right in, no questions asked. i was struck by how sad the room was. in there were my aunts, my parents, my two younger siblings (my older brother hadn't been able to make it out of work yet), and all of my cousins who had been able to make it. not a single one of them wasn't crying.

time for some background history. grandpa had been struggling with a rare blood cancer (multiple myeloma, i do believe), which had resulted in an amputated leg. for obvious reasons, that put a serious damper in his seriously active lifestyle. he struggled with pneumonia and a handful of other infections. lung tumors. what landed him in the hospital this time was a heart attack--on top of the pneumonia. the topper? the cardiologist said this actually wasn't his first heart attack. he'd had several over the years. proof of how much pain he was in 24/7: he didn't even feel not one, but several, heart attacks. two arteries were completely blocked, one was 90% blocked. grumpa had seen better days.
there were surgeries that could be done, but given grandpa's now-weak state, there were incredible chances that he wouldn't even make it off the operating table. eventually, we decided we had to at least try. so that day i got that awful, awful text from mom, he had gone in to have a stent put it. long story short, it didn't go well.

so here i am, crying. with 31083740183 other people in the room, also crying. there were moments where every labored breath--remember the pneumonia--was a cause for panic. what if this was it? what if this was the last time we ever saw him? the family noticed me in the corner, and encouraged me to say hello, let him know i was here for him.
i almost didn't want to. i didn't like seeing the grandpa that demanded i smile for him so i could be pretty so sick in his creaky hospital bed. he had a tube sticking out from his neck; the hole was massive. there was blood matted around the incision. the rest of him didn't look much better. he kept complaining that he was hot, but his skin wasn't warm to the touch. but i knew that when i walked away from that room, for the last time, after he was gone forever, i would regret not telling him i was there, and holding his hand, and telling him i loved him.
so i walked up, painfully aware that everyone in the room was watching me, and grasped his hand. he barely held mine back, but didn't open his eyes to see who was touching him.
'dad? jade's here...' my aunt sharla told him, nudging his stub gently. i say stub, because that was his amputated side.
'jade's here?' he asked faintly, and spared me a one-eyed glance, keeping the other closed. 'glad you could make it,' he said with his old familiar sense of humor. it's hard to keep guys like grandpa down. they're just too damn...good.
of course i was sobbing, but i couldn't help but laugh a little. at least there were parts of grandpa that were still there, even without a leg, a whole heart, lungs that would breathe for him, blood that worked the way it was supposed to; he still had his dry, witty personality, his family, his faith. 'glad to be here.' and i let grandma reclaim her spot at grumpa's side.
i'm told that earlier, he had told grandma that her fingernails were dirty. also without opening his eyes. that was grandpa for you. anything to draw attention away from the pain--and i have the most hideous suspicion that he did it to take our minds off our pain, not his mind off of his. he was one of those people who gave and gave. even on his deathbed.

eventually, we kind of stopped crying. we had it resigned--this was it, he was dying...he'd be angry if he were coherent enough to realize how upset we all were. so we might as well make the best of it. it is what it is. there were even jokes cracked every now and then. all the stragglers who needed to get out of school, tests, and work had made it to say their goodbyes and express their love for the greatest man any of us have ever met.

eventually the time came where breathing was harder. not the normal pneumonia-breaths, but the kind where you know that he's not getting air, his heart isn't working. sharla was watching the monitor all night, being a nurse and all, she knew what all the numbers and lines and beeping meant. she said we needed to get grandma, who had stepped out to go to the bathroom, asap. his pulse and oxygen levels were dropping at an alarming rate. he was dying.
mom pushed through all of us who were by the bed. we were in her way, and she had something she needed to say before he passed. she leaned over, gave her father-in-law a hug, and whispered something in his ear. i now know that what she whispered was 'thank you.'

it's amazing how much two words can say, in so little time, sometimes with so little effort.

there was a bit of mass confusion, as i noted strange things, and sometimes thought too coherently given the circumstance. i thought to send my sister out of the room, who was having a hard time handling her first brush with death. but i noticed the color of the straw of my coke--a cheery blue, with red stripes. i noticed all of grandma's turkey had slid out of her sandwich she sent for. i thought to grab grandpa's hand, even if he couldn't feel it, so at least i would know i was there for him in the end. i saw my dad truly cry for what could have possibly been the first time in my life. i watched as the heart rate went flat, my grandma lost what had been left her raw composure, and noticed that the time on the machine didn't match the time of the clock on the wall. the fact that it was a little funny that his second-to last statement in this life was 'ah...shit.' and his final words were, 'oh, i'm sick.'

i couldn't stop crying. i was in near hysterics. everyone grouped into their own families, hugging and giving support, occasionally walking up to grandpa and giving him a kiss on the cheek while his body was still warm; while it still felt like he could get up and walk out of this room like he had so many times before.

the most heartbreaking thing you'll ever see is the look on your grandmother's face when she just loses the man she's been in love with over 50 years.

the words were the same 'this is a nightmare.' 'what am i going to do without you?' 'why didn't you tell me you were sick'. we hugged her, offering her support, while trying glean some of her strength for ourselves. breck--my sister--needed to leave. now. she couldn't handle this anymore. so i offered to take her home. i needed to leave.
i hugged grandpa for the final time. i whispered in his ear things i was too scared to say out loud. things that didn't need an audience. things that probably didn't even need words. things like i love you and thank you so much for raising that guy that is my father, for making him so wonderful and thank you for being there for me. i needed to pull myself together. i needed caffeine. i needed to get the next couple of days' shifts worked out to allow for personal grieving, funeral preparations, and the actual proceedings. i needed to handle this like a big kid.

i said all the right things. i gave breck the pep talk: grumpa was in a better place. he had his leg back. he wasn't in pain anymore. he had gone surrounded by the people he loved, who loved him just as much. we were honored to have him as such a strong role model, to have him looking out for us.
it helped.
we held hands on the way home. we were uncertain what to do with the music, having it on seemed too cheerful, having it off was too quiet. so we settled for having it so quiet that you had to strain to hear it. we did well until part of the radio offered a 'goodnight kisses' segment, where people could call in and give 'goodnight kisses' to those who meant the most to them. the girl who got through offered hers to her grandpa--the greatest grandpa in the world--and she loved him so much, thank you for everything, blah blah blah. didn't she know that MY grandpa was the best in the world? sure, hers is probably great. but mine is, was, and always will be better. that's how grandpa worked--go big or go home. don't sweat the small stuff. a job worth doing is a job worth doing well.
i lost it. completely lost it. i wailed. like i would imagine a banshee would sound like had she just lost her grandfather. breck lost it when i did. she tried to be brave for me, expecting me to be brave in return, and i let her down.
cars behind us at the stop light were honking, because i couldn't seem to remember how to steer and push the gas pedal at the same time. i flipped them off because i didn't care where they needed to be. didn't they know that something life-altering had just happened to me? i wasn't on the phone, i wasn't talking to a car full of friends, i wasn't in the bahamas. i was sad. so, so sad.

finally we got home. i took care of my dog. i took a shower. i cried until my throat hurt and my nose gave rudolph's a run for its money and i was choking. the sounds coming out of me shouldn't have even been possible. every little thought did it--that he wouldn't be able to check his facebook page anymore (not that he really knew how to work it), that if i left him a message (not that i had been caring enough to ever do it before), he'd never read it. that he was probably making fun of me for being so soft, which made me cry harder. because i wanted him THERE to make fun of me for being soft, to tell me that it is what it is and i shouldn't sweat the small stuff. grumpa would consider him dying somewhere in the category of 'small stuff.'

dad came home. how sad he was almost compared to how sad grandma was. dad was the only son, so he'd had a particularly strong bond with his daddy. not unlike my bond with my daddy. he laid on his bed, and i laid with my head on his stomach, and he comforted me while i cried. he was strong for me, even though i hadn't been strong enough for my sister. dad had been prepared for this. had prepared for years. it took me by surprise. i had truly expected grumpa to walk away from this. like normal.

but life isn't normal anymore.

i weeped harder when i realized sometimes i'd have to do with my dad. and that it would be a million times more difficult for me than this was. i'm not convinced that i'm going to be able to handle it. Daddy is now fully aware that he isn't allowed to die. not anytime soon. not ever. i forbade it.

but what i've learned from my first life-altering experience with death? life goes on. the ambulances and police cars that whizzed past me on the freeway on mine and breck's escape home reminded me of that.
i'm not the only one out there. other people's lives are still happening. mine isn't the only one who's been turned upside down. and i wasn't alone.
you are strong enough to deal with God dishes you. grandpa did it every day. i can too. all i have to do is remember what he did, occasionally ask for help, use the resources he gave me, like a fantastic daddy, and follow his example.

Dear God,
I hope you realize how lucky you are to get to hand out with the great LaVell J Jensen every day from now on. He's easily one of your better creations.

Love,
Me