Just came back from PA. We hadn't been there in 9 years and like Annie said, it just felt normal. I was supposed to write a memory of my mother-in-law in a memory book that I insisted we purchase. In the end, I didn't write anything. It was a lovely week. Yesterday, the day of the party/memorial, I was really sad and kept randomly crying. Everything made me sad; a song, a glance at the shed, hugging my brother-in-law. Even though Peg died over a year ago and I had cried previously, this day/celebration, July 5, 2025, made it final. Until then I could keep kicking the can down the road. The "Property House", as we like to call it, is where my kids spent their summers with their cousins swimming in the pond, catching frogs, walking through paths, picking blackberries, playing Guitar Hero in the basement, watching movies in the "theater room" and Sponge Bob in the "3 seasons room" off the kitchen, learning not to run the water so the well didn't run dry, shooting pellet guns, eating Krispy Kreme donuts, and so many other memories. It was 75 acres to run free and just be a kid, all sponsored by my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law. Grampa Jerry would cook burgers on the grill, Grammy Peg would make blackberry jam and zucchini bread from with zucchinis from her garden. We'd drive back and forth between Washington and Mt Lebanon, PA to skate at the ice rink, watch movies at the mall, and eat pizza at their cousins' house after baseball games. Most of the time we'd drive up to PA, slowly winding our way across the country with the kids in the back of the silver Honda minivan, sometimes with our niece on the way home and sometimes with the dog for the whole journey. We'd stop and see my dad, Lee's brother, friends in TN or KY, my father-in-law and his wife outside of Ft Worth, my grandmother in Wisconsin. The kids were wee little and the time rocketed by. In the interim kids have graduated high school, college, medical school, residency, fellowship, graduate school, earned graduate degrees, gotten jobs, moved to different states. My mother-in-law and her husband moved to Texas in 2016 followed by my sister-in-law a few years later. Jerry died in January 2018 and Peg died on May 4, 2024. Peg lived with us for a year - September 2022 to September 2023. It was the first year we were "empty nesters" but we weren't really because we had Peg with us. We did puzzles together, watched movies and TV shows, went with her to her doctors' appointments, reminded her to take her medicine, use her nebulizer machine, and eat her food. She had spent so much time taking care of us (and for my husband, even longer) that it was time for us to take care of her. She died pretty quickly and, though not unexpectedly, I don't think anyone was truly prepared. Lee, Eleanor, and Katie were with her when she died. Everyone was able to say goodbye on the telephone and she was able to tell everyone that she loved them.
Especially after the tragedy of the flooding in central Texas this past Friday, I realize the sanctity of life and how fast and fleeting it all is. I was talking to Michael, Jerry's son, and we agreed that Peg and Jerry both had a good run (88 and 84 years old). However, you can't help but play some of the memories on rerun and feel bittersweet. I know this past week we were making new memories with new members of the family who haven't taken the place of the old ones but whom we welcome with so much joy. It's absolutely what Peg and Jerry would have wanted. They blended 2 families into one. Maybe someday I'll send Easter cards with a $5 bill in them or sit on the floor of my children's hallway and play race cars with Hot Wheels, or let my granddaughter "do" my hair, or make chocolate chip cookies for my grandkids, or come take care of my grandbabies when they are born, or my kids or their spouses when they are sick. Peg loved every minute of being a mother and a grandmother and she taught me what it means to be a mother-in-law. She gave her whole heart, told stories about her youth and her cousins, aunt/uncles/grandparents/great-grandparents, and reinforced the sanctity of family.
What Eleanor gave us this week was an extension of her mom and it was a labor of love, hard earned over the past 12 months. By requiring us all to take part and to make it happen she was gifting us each a little piece of Peg (and Jerry) and it was more than the cup of ashes we each spread across the property. We might have rolled our eyes or been annoyed when we had to power wash or vacuum, or cut flowers, or made the 100th trip to Walmart, or clandestinely deposited garbage/recycling, or washed windows, or dug in the rock garden in the blistering sun, but we were all grabbing hold of Grammy (and Jerry) and we didn't even realize it. Those dinners at the dining room table this past week were priceless, as were the belly laughs as we sat in the front room this morning. And my little Dr Nuh, who selflessly held her mom's hand as she sprinted across the finish line these past 2 weeks, that was the biggest gift you've ever given Grammy. Same with K and D with their gifts of time (and their amazing partners, Z, A, B - talk about support system). God has blessed your mama (and all of us) with the gift of you 3. My 3, I don't need to tell you how much I love you and L & J, how critical it was to have you with us at the house and for your parents to let us have free rein.
So what are my best memories of Peg? Damn, I couldn't even write them all down. They come to me with so many breaths - when I look at my dining room light fixture and Jake's Topo Chico collection and think how much she told me she hated them or how she'd kiss me on the head every night that she lived with us and thanked me for another day. But mostly when I look at my husband, kids, and my family and I thank God for how she endures in each one of them.
