Right after I got back from South Carolina, I found out my Aunt Nita was coming down from Priest River, Idaho for a visit. I was so excited. I hadn't seen her since right before I got married in January 2004.
Growing up, I used to fantasize that my Aunt was my real Mom, and that someday the family would tell me the truth. Nita and I have always been close. My Grandma always calls her Holly and me Nita. I like to think that I get my courage, my outspokenness, my straight-forwardness and my willingness to try something people tell you girls shouldn't do from her. My Aunt ran away from home at 15 to join a traveling carnival company and just basically get the hell out of here. She didn't come from a very loving family. In fact, she had it pretty rough. Throughout her life, she did things like pump concrete, tend bar, ran with bikers and generally did what she needed to do to get by, but she never treated the world like it owed her anything. She still showed the people close to her love and kindness. When I was little, she taught me how to use a bull whip. When I was a preteen, I used to bum smokes off of her. When I was a teenager, and running with my own bad crowd and struggling with my own demons, she gave me some sage-like advice, because she knew I was gonna do what I was gonna do, she just wanted me to be aware of my surroundings, so to speak. She, like many people, including myself, had a period in her life where she struggled with her own vices, but she pulled herself together long enough to rejoin society and live a mostly normal life, surrounded by friends in a beautiful little town in northern Idaho.
I soon found out the reason for my Aunt's unexpected and unannounced return. She had been diagnosed a year ago with cervical cancer (the same cancer they made me get a biopsy for a year ago) and that it had spread to her lungs and liver. Her friends had pooled their resources to get her a flight down here for a few days so she could visit with my Mom, my Grandmother and myself. When I first found out, I was in shock. Here she was, the woman I always wanted to be my Mom, back in my immediate reach and she's gonna die. It was one of those moments where you can almost feel something, like the snapping of a twig, in your chest, as you feel a piece of your heart break.
Between school and Mock Trial practice, I never seem to have any free time anymore, but I carved out as much of it as I could over the 4 days she was here. She, my Grandma and I went to Red Lobster one day for lunch. The other days I would come over after school at night and we would talk. I could always confide in my Aunt and talk to her about anything, so I took some time to do that. I volunteered to take her back to the airport that Saturday. She made me promise I would fly up there at the end of the semester to visit. I told her I would.
The morning of January 22nd was my Aunt's 52nd birthday and I had planned on printing out some photos, sending them to her along with a card and calling her and telling her Happy Birthday. Earlier in the week, Grandma had said that Nita was in the hospital. Nita had told me before she left that she was going in to have some procedure done, so I wasn't TOO worried. I got to my Dad's that morning to print the photos on his computer. I had just sat down with my cereal when my Dad said to me "Your Aunt Nita passed last night. We didn't want to tell you because you were at school and we didn't want you to be upset when you drove home. I'm so sorry My Girl."
Even as I type this the tears won't stop. It still feels like hearing it over again for the first time. Words can't express how that hurt. It hurt like nothing else that had ever hurt me before, like a whole new hurt. I wasn't really sure how to process it. I'm still not sure.
I knew my Grandma would need me at that moment. I called her and then later went over and watched my Grandma cry for the first time in my life. Nita was her youngest and this day would have been her birthday.
The next few days were a blur. I vacillated between sorrow, anger, fear, resentment, duty, guilt, denial, acceptance, for days. Nita would have wanted me to say "F*** it" and just keep going on with my life, because when her life got hard, as it often did, that's what she did. She sucked it up and dealt with it, even when she got cancer. I can still hear her voice. "Sweetie, you just have to play the cards you are dealt. There's nothing else you can do."
When I needed to cry, I cried. When I needed to be distracted, I had people in my life to distract me, to make me laugh, instead of asking me to talk about how I felt all the time.
As if that wasn't messed up enough, my laptop catches a virus then my cell phone decides to stop holding a charge, so for 2 days I had no cell phone while my warranty replacement phone was in transit. The laptop took a bit longer, since I had to drop it off to my friend Greg to fix and it took several hours of work to do so, but is back up and running in time for me to start my online classes next term.
So that's been my January and the first part of my February. I'm glad its over. Moving forward, I have my first Mock Trial Competition and my return visit to South Carolina at the end of the month to look forward to, so, I guess the old saying is true. "Life goes on..."
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