1. No Time
2. Not emotionally ready
3. Didn't know what to say
This past month (May) I have been in West Virginia serving my family as best I can whether that be running errands, driving, babysitting, cleaning, cooking, just hanging out, or being there when the nurse was. In April my grandmother (Nonne to me) was diagnosed with cancer of unknown origin. I'm pretty sure my heart stopped when my mother told me. I couldn't believe it how in the world could this happen? It was stage 4. The outcome wasn't good. She was laying in the hospital as fluid was slowly filling her lungs. I couldn't stay in Amsterdam and do nothing...Not that praying isn't anything, but you know what I mean. So I took the earliest flight possible. I haven't regretted it for a moment.
It was a good, long, tough, emotional, heart-wrenching month. I got to laugh with her, share some stories of my sojourns, reminisce, grow with God, and learn. And this is what I learned.
"There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain,
a time to search and a to give up,
a time to keep and a to throw away,
a time to tear down and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace."
~ Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
It's been a hard lesson and I'm still trying to figure out when all the right times are, but thats what God's for right? He'll show me the way.
So on May 31, 2011 My Nonne Rose Mary B. Tennant passed away.
Coming to West Virginia I had the overwhelming sense of being blessed. God has given me so much. He gave me a grandmother who lived her life to the fullest. Put her all into everything, appreciated the beauty in everything. Who had such passion for life that when you were around her you couldn't help but feel it spill over to you. I'm going to miss her more than words can say, and I don't know if I've quite grasped that she's gone. I am forever thankful for being able to spend her last month with her.
Below is a letter I wrote and read at her funeral.
Dear Nonne,
From the moment I would walk into your house I was greeted with a warm hello and a “Come give your Nonne a big kiss!” You would then ask if I was wearing an undershirt and I would eagerly nod yes so I could receive my 25 cents. From late night movies of Shirley Temple and her 55 curls “every night her mother would put them in” you would tell me, to the animal shows about snakes and other slimy reptiles, from my first prom dress to my costume for a play, you were there. With a word of encouragement or advice, “Eliza make sure you slow down when you speak and ENUNCIATE, enunciate, enunciate” When I called and asked you for some background on your family for a school project, I was treated to stories of how your grandmother went into labor in a tomato patch in Italy and when her overly social husband didn’t make it back in time she cut the umbilical cord with her teeth, how your mother cooked turtles, and the barber shop your daddy owned. Trips to Gabs turned into fabulous adventures and whole day excursions. There was never a dull moment.
When you said you were going to Italy to look up long lost relatives I jumped at the chance to go. What an adventure was that! Filled with memories that I will treasure forever. Walking through your great-grandmothers house, attending mass where your ancestors did, finding the Brunetti family crest, riding in tiny cars through the hillside of San Giovanni in Fiore, discovering your cousins and eating dinner at their house, climbing step after step to some ancient ruins in Sicily, playing Canasta every evening. You opened my eyes to how big the world is and how much there is to see, you appreciated the beauty in everything. You gave me a gift that I can never repay of daring to dream big and push on.
So Nonne, Gratzie and Aldente (Well done, she always used that the wrong way),
I love you,
Eliza
