Best Seen In Black and White

I am not prepared for how my mom is passing from earth to heaven.  I haven’t had a lot of practice, peripheral at best.  Most deaths of those close to me were sudden, unexpected, and, therefore, mostly missed.  My dad was different.  He died of cancer.  I never knew him not to have it, so when he finally succumbed to it, it was mostly like a normal part of his life and, therefore mine.  But my mom is slowly passing.  She is passing in stages, over years, unbecoming what she had become, a great, prolonged, unraveling.  Each stage takes time and toil, and each stage she and I live through.  First her body, next her mind, still in process, and heartbreakingly, now I am beginning to see her living faith fading away.  She is not losing the Christ of her faith but just the knowledge of it and Him.  We sing hymns with her; she still knows some of the words.  Jesus Love Me is her favorite, I’m sure, because it was imprinted in the youngest, deepest recess of her mind and heart.  She still knows a few words of her faith, pray, the strongest, but most others are lost to her too.  This is all bittersweet.  Bitter to watch, sweet to know it has no bearing on her coming eternity.  I have learned a lot of lessons through this, but the most important thing is that no one knows how they are going to die.  We must all prepare for doing something, having no idea how we will do it.    

Mom and me when she and I were becoming together.