Sarah Needs a Kidney

Sarah turns 27 years old today. This is my virtual “Happy Birthday” to her. Last night as the clock struck midnight, she posted this message to Facebook: “27 years ago the world was graced with my presence. Yay.” “Yay” is right. Happy Freakin’ Birthday, Sarah. You deserve this day, and thousands more to come. Now, on to getting you that one big birthday wish :)

Photo Creative Commons Theresa Thompson

*A departure from my usual post, I just needed a place to write.

It was a Monday morning when I got the call, my 82 year-old grandmother passed away. It was very unexpected. Her companion, a wonderful man named Dan, found her unresponsive in her bedroom on his way to pick her up to go to the doctor’s office. Over the last few weeks, she complained of not feeling well and that morning a visit to the doctor was supposed to cure her of all anxiety—but that visit never came.

My grandmother’s death hit me harder than I thought it would. I had the chance to fly home just a few months prior to attend a wedding and spent an unusually pleasant afternoon picking my grandmother’s brain about her family, her 10 brothers (most of whom had preceded her in death), and about what it was like raising my *wonderful* mother. This visit was longer than most, as I often found it difficult to communicate with her the older she got. She was born and raised in Puerto Rico, as was my mother, and her English had never been very good. Or, I should say, it was good when she wanted it to be. But to be fair, I never really sat myself down to learn her language either, something I regret to this day. But the visit was longer thanks in large part to the curiosity of my boyfriend Sol who, having grown up without close grandparents around, reveled in the wisdom and great story telling she possessed. I was learning so much about her through him. It was magical.

All the ladies at my college graduation_2007

I wasn’t able to fly back to California right away, but I made arrangements to visit my family the following weekend, in time to help my mom set up for a small memorial service she was planning at my grandmother’s senior center. The large family that my grandmother grew up with was all but gone, having lost touch with most of them over the years through the passing of her older brothers. So a small service for those who knew my grandmother as “hot pants” around the senior home seemed a bit more appropriate for the occasion. We would have our own remembrance another time.

The weekend was calm, helping my mother when I could and trying not to get in anyone’s way. We had some laughs as we sorted through my grandmother’s jewelry collection, which was as tacky as they come. And of course, there were a few tears as we sat with Dan as he told us about his hard days and sleepless nights, experiences not too unfamiliar for any of us at the time.

My time home was short, but very sweet, and on my last day there, we got the news that new life was coming into our family, the first for my extended family of five brothers and sisters. It’s funny how life works out like this, hitting you hard when you least expect it, then handing you a gentle reminder of the beauty within it.

And now, to leave you with a few lines from “En Mi Viejo San Juan” or “In My Old San Juan,” a classic song for those who hold Puerto Rico close to their hearts, just as my grandmother did:

In my Old San Juan, many dreams I forged in my childhood years
My first illusion, and my grief of love are memories of the soul
One afternoon I left for a foreign nation, that’s how destiny would have it
But my heart remained in front of the sea, of my Old San Juan.