Good-bye, Granny

And so she came to pass. As she had met the many troubles in her life, my mother-in-law greeted death with minimal fuss. She went to sleep one night, stayed asleep the next day and quietly passed into the great hereafter overnight. I wish I knew how she did it so I could do the same when I’m 94—or 90, because that’s when her quality of life began to deteriorate with dementia. 

And now begins the paperwork. The great snarls of red tape, the Rubik’s Cubes of catch-22s, the mountains of documents in triplicate—poor Other has barely finished putting his late sister’s estate to rest and now another volcano of bureautrash has spewed forth. 

The heaps of legal requirements, the fees for filing this and that, the barriers to getting things done, diminish the person who has died. There’s little time or brainspace to reflect on the life that has ended. 

But I do know my kids have lost the one person who never, not even for a moment, took anything but pleasure in them. She was the ultimate spoiler, the one who comforted them with ice cream when I had scolded them, who rented seaside vacation homes to lure them—and their friends—to visit, who tried to give them all the good things, who never tried to teach them a lesson. They were so lucky to have her! And so was I.