I've been sitting with this blank entry for an hour now, hesitant to post. She might pull through, she might not...but in any event, we're completing Mom's funeral planning form tonight. She's been ill for a week now. She can't keep anything down. She is suffering. A week ago they told us that her scan looked good. The results of that scan never really felt good to me, though...and we have been advised to contact hospice care. I sighed to Debbie yesterday afternoon, "I just wish I could see her...I wish I didn't have this stupid cold."

Debbie, busy ironing, paused and said around trembling lips, "Laura, that doesn't really matter now." And, I realized the scale, the point of equilibrium in our lives, needed to be adjusted. It isn't something that we haven't been preparing for during the last six months...the last two and a half years...I can keep my head on straight. I can oversee that things are done to her wishes. I can keep the cacophony and hysteria separate from the realm of her final moments. I can remind her of beauty, and love, and light, and I will probably even be able to make her smile. I can praise my God for the gift of her life, and I can say goodbye.

And then I'm going to find a quiet corner and cry.