Funeral

I think one sign of aging is when you see certain people only at funerals. At my grandmother's funeral a couple of weeks back, I saw people (relatives really) whom I had not seen since my father's funeral a year and a half ago. It reminds me of younger days when I saw certain people only at weddings.

Anyway, my maternal grandmother passed away recently just short of her 92nd birthday. She lived a long life, so this was not a morbid affair, but one with humour and stories. She married at age 18, in a classic Ontario 1930s shotgun wedding, something that had been kept a closely-guarded secret for years. My grandmother refused to entertain questions about how old she was when she married in combination with the question of how old she currently was. I assumed that this was part of a larger plan to hide her age, but it was an effort to hide her shame, a shame she seemed to carry for most of her life. Once Alzheimer's crept in, I suppose she no longer thought about it.

Of course, by the time I had figured it out, pregnancy out of wedlock was no longer an issue, at least for most people. After all, my brothers had been spreading their seed far and wide with no regard for tradition, and that seemed like normal practice to me.

Alzheimer's is a horrible affliction and I hope I never have to confront it. The first time my grandmother failed to recognize me was a shock. After some time, she managed to put it all together, but more recently, she didn't have a clue, and that was very sad.

She is now resting (I'm not sure that I like this term) beside her husband who predeceased her by 29 years, and her grandson, who passed away at the age of 5. I remember him well.