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Dear friend and great being, Tofah Eileen, slipped into the other realm yesterday after a courageous dance with cancer. Her life love, Jay, wrote so eloquently every step of their shared experience and for that I am so grateful. His intimate stories revealed the piercing beauty of their time together and let us all feel nearer to them. For me, Eileen will be remembered as a Sufi priestess, a smiling shaman of radiant power and a laughing goddess of enlightening. She ran deep but had a brilliant cackle, like an ancient body of water that is tickled by every skipper ripple at the surface. An irresistible star, she drew so naturally a constellation of loving community around her and burned so brightly in her last days that her physicalness became incidental. She approached the crossing and literally became the Light that is her name.
You are loved and missed, Eileen.
Dear furry friend and familiar, Chili Mama, slipped free of her body this morning and went to frolic in kitty heaven, where I hope the mice abound in tall grasses and the air smells like tuna. It's been a long time coming but we knew this day was close at hand. She'd been getting more and more physically frail and was obviously extremely uncomfortable in her body but we kept putting off the hard thing. It's a deep knife to the heart deciding to put down a loved one. Chili's been with us a long time. Nineteen years ago I picked her from a batch of cardboard-box kitties outside a Safeway in a moment of weakness. She sat up on my pregnant belly all the way home, looking out through the steering wheel. I snuck her into the house under my shirt because Rob and I hadn't talked about any plans for another cat but she charmed him right off by standing up on her hind legs for a full minute looking about with intense curiosity. So she slipped into our life and hearts. She became my snuggle baby during the final weeks of my pregnancy and she curled quietly on the bed for the whole labor and birth of India. Things got a bit touchy then, when she realized her prima status had been ursurped by this new kid in town . She broke alot of nice stuff and made herself a nuisance for some months as she worked out her jealous feelings but she never scratched India and was surprisingly tolerant of being tugged and bopped by a baby. She's been through alot with us. Interstate moves, illnesses, other kitties, another baby. She's had a long life full of nuzzles and coos, wild romps and explorations. I like to think she had it good and was happy. Finally, the decision was made and we called our long time vet Sandy Nelson who has served us so well all these years. She makes house calls and came out this morning after the kids said their goodbye and were dropped off at Grandma and Grandpa's. We spent the last hour holding and comforting her. Sandy arrived. A sedative, a delicate needle and she was gone. Goodbye, sweet Chiliquin. You are loved.
Top Photo: Chili's grave with marigolds. Buried under the tree we were married beneath in Crane Creek Park.
Photo: Me and Chili, Summer 1989
This morning, at a little after seven, Sylvia, mother of six daughters, grandmother and great grandmother to many more of us, passed away swiftly and peacefully at age 86. She had struggled with her heart and her bones these past months but was a lucid trooper 'til the end. She left many sad ones behind, family and friends old, new and dear. As many of the daughters as could (my aunts) gathered in her little apartment at Brighton Gardens among her curios and keepsakes, all which struck me suddenly as poignantly ephemeral and precious. I felt blessed to be among them to say goodbye. Grandma looked serene in the soft light and we all felt relieved that her pain was over at last. Still, it's hard to accept the finality of death. Her body that bore six beautiful women is now outgrown. She left its weight and became light. Her particular softness, strength and smile is no longer tangible in the physical world and that is true sadness. Worthy of grief. Only heart and memory and the faces of grandchildren now hold her. Her earthly story is ended. Secret dreams and struggles, unspoken experience, joys, pains and intimacies are lost to us. That ruthless severing is the sharpness of death but the brightness outweighs. She is free from pain. She lived a long and full life close to her family. She was loved and will be remembered by many. Lastly, I happen to believe she has gone to join up with her love, my Grandpa Albert and that's a happy thought. Reunion with the beloved is a good good thing.
