I’m just a little tired of this.
I was out for the last couple days after my brother-in-law lost his wife after a 4-year battle with lymphoma. She lasted longer than any doctor expected, but in the end cancer wins as it usually does.
This afternoon my father calls to tell me that my grandmother has passed. She was a few months shy of her 91st year. Arguably, anyone passing at that age should not be considered a surprise. Yet with her it was. Still active and living on her own. Volunteering at the hospital, the library and putting together the Synagogue’s monthly newsletter.
When my grandfather passed earlier this year, it was a long battle that eventually took him and was something of a relief as he was no longer in the pain that had engulfed him. With my grandmother, it was a sudden heart attack that was complete and immediate.
The two had been divorced for almost 50 years, yet they both passed within six months of the other. As big an impact as my grandfather had on me, so too did my grandmother.
She loved baseball and football. As much as anyone, she taught me a good deal about football when I was young. She probably knew the game better than my grandfather, because she wasn’t focused just on the pro game. The college game was just as interesting to her. She was a fan of innovative thinking for offense. Bill Walsh was a coach she really liked, and was a fan of offenses like the spread that took advantage of the talent.
In 1999 I went to visit her around Rosh Hashanah. My parents couldn’t get back to be with her, so I went because it just didn’t seem right for her to be alone for the High Holy Days.
Selfishly, it wasn’t the easiest call since it meant skipping a road trip with friends for the Pitt-Penn State game in Happy Valley that same weekend. I didn’t mention it to her, and didn’t even mention the game. Resigning myself to maybe catching the second half. We were sitting in Shul, and around 11 am she leans whispers to me that we should leave in the next 15 minutes to get some lunch so we can be ready to watch the game by noon.
Didn’t miss a snap of that game.
