Life is never quite real until it happens.
I watched for years as she slowly slipped away. I watched the forgetting. I watched the regression. I waited for the day when she could say "I love you too" no longer. I hoped it would never come, but seasons change and years pass and the innocence of first snowfall is broken. White turns to gray, beauty to slush, and Death reaches out his shriveled fingers. I know she couldn't refuse.
I miss my grandmother. I miss the woman who laughed and tickled and did everything to make me smile. I miss the woman who played with me in pajamas and saved me from the Wicked Witch and made funny faces as soon as the camera flashed. I miss the lingering smell from latkes and the hours of anticipation New Hampshire bound. I miss the laughing and the hugging and the coming together again. I miss having a Bubbe to call my own.
The mirrors are covered, but I've stopped looking anyhow, and instead of ball drops, funeral bells will reign. The world keeps turning. New Years is on the way.
