Sad memories

[Merykk]

We got new computers recently, and in tranferring all the files, I came across some pictures that my mom took almost a year ago. She flew in from Sweden with my sister, and I drove from Indy to Kissimee, FL to visit my grandfather in the hospital. He'd been battling multiple myeloma for 8 years. Until he fell and broke his arm, no one knew just how bad he'd gotten. It turned out that he had congestive heart failure, and his kidneys were working at 15%. Needless to say, things did not look good. We were there for 5 days. I got to talk to my grandfather, and he told me how proud he was of how I'd turned out. I also got to hear him tell my sister that she "kind of scares people sometimes." Heh.

He died about a week after I got home, four days after I found out that I was pregnant with my daughter. Before the cancer, he was a robust man with a pot belly who ate those sugar-coated orange slices, made omelettes for breakfast, and hunted bears. It breaks my heart to see this last picture of him... I hate remembering him reduced to such a state: his spine curved forward, unable to walk unassisted, barely able to speak.