Laugh

I believe that a person's true character shines forth during times of hardship and adversity... for better or for worse. 

About a week ago my dear, sweet grandma had a stroke.  You must understand, my grandma is young, active and always on the go, so when I received the call that she was in the hospital and had suffered a stroke I was shocked and devastated. It was just a week or two ago that she was chasing Emma and Ali all over the park while lugging Canyon around on her hip because he wanted snuggles. The stroke left her with some right-sided weakness and the inability to talk or eat.  She is able to write a little bit but it's slow going and takes a lot of effort.  She knows what she wants to say but getting it out, verbally or on paper is really difficult.  I can't even imagine how scary and frustrating it would be to lose the ability to communicate and it breaks my heart to see her trying so hard to talk but and not being able to. 

Today I took my two little ones to go visit her while Emma was in school. I was sitting on her bed just talking to her while my two little monkeys snuggled up next to her, every once in a while she would try to talk and when that failed write and when that failed act out what she was trying to say. I'm terrible at charades. Embarrassingly so. She'd just shake her head, shrug and silently laugh. At one point she was trying to write something out and kept getting stuck.  She finally shook her head, crossed out the word she had been working on and looked up at me with a twinkle in her eye and leaned down to write out a shaky l-a-u-g-h. Laugh. I did laugh, but also started to cry a bit. I knew exactly what she meant. Laughter is stronger than frustration or self-pity.

My grandma has always been a great example to me. In fact not too long ago I told her I wanted to be just like her when I grow up.  To know my grandma is to know love, pure, self-less love. As I have watched her through her current trial she has continued to put others before herself. You'd be surprised how much nurturing she is still able to accomplish from her hospital bed ;).  And although she has had her moments of tears and I'm sure moments of being utterly terrified, she pushes through with laughter and a constant smile in her eyes. My dad made the comment that she is still here because they haven't found a nice enough place in heaven for her yet.  I think he's on to something.

I'm going to keep on trying to love more and or course, laugh more, in hopes that one day I will be a little something like her.