My Aunt died this morning. Though I have had a lot of women in my life I called Aunty she was my only actual Aunt.
She didn’t like me much.
To be fair a lot of people who were adults when I was a kid didn’t like me much, I was very annoying. I also found her very overwhelming when I was small, she was loud and enthusiastic and far too much for a small Mish to deal with. When visiting her house I would generally make a beeline for the much quieter confines of my Grandma’s area.
This blog is bookended by deaths, one of the earliest entries I wrote in this blog was about my Grandma’s funeral, it’s currently the earliest entry still extant.
I mentioned the comfort of barely touching fingers between my Aunt and Uncle that I saw then. I think my Uncle will likely be very lonely tonight. I know the sort of grief my cousins will be feeling and it’s pretty horrible.
My sister managed to go up to sit by her bedside and say goodbye, I would have liked to but of course I realised when my sister and Mum were talking and planning that my Aunt wouldn’t have. When you’re the weird annoying kid that cuts both ways of course and who wants that at your bedside when you’re dying. So I didn’t go, nor did my Mum but my sister got to say goodbye to my Aunt in a small hospital room that my cousin had made look lovely and in a few weeks I’m going to get some sweet peas tattooed on myself and quietly grieve somewhere off to the side.
This afternoon it was the Tiny Yokai’s birthday party. My sister would’ve invited my Aunt, who, if she’d made it would have liked the kids games and such. She was a teacher her whole life and liked kids, I spent a lot of time the past few weeks sending her photos of stuff we were doing with my niblings because it was something we both agreed was great fun, doing stuff with the kids.
It’s not yet Mabon and already there’s an extra place I’m planning for Samhain. I don’t think it’s my melancholy nature that has me thinking that life has all these bookmarks left in it where significant people stopped making their marks.
At some point I’m going to finish the bathroom supplies she sent me last Christmas. At some point I’m going to do Christmas baking this year and have one less Christmas cake. People stopping making their marks.
My Aunt, died this morning, older than her older brother, surrounded by people who loved her. Which I suspect is as good as you can hope for.
