Remembering

Eulogy. What does that mean to you? By definition it's a formal speech or piece of writing praising a person or thing, especially a person who has recently died. Sadly, my grandpa passed away a few weeks ago. I know that I shouldn't be overtaken by sadness as he lived a good life. He was 93 and up until the last 3 years or so had remained fairly active. Unfortunately, Alzheimers Disease robbed him of his more recent memories and caused him confusion and his family heartache knowing that he had no idea who we were. I will say that the last time I was able to see him, while he didn't "know" us, he treated us as friends and seemed to know that we were someone special to him. I was unable to fly out to Michigan to be with my family and I have to say it made me think about a lot of things. How much I miss my family. How much I feel like the odd person out, like I don't even know what's going on with them. I worry about my parents and it saddens me that they don't get to spend any time with their grandkids. I haven't spent much quality time with my siblings or cousins either, which made me feel awful. It made me wonder what others, especially my children, will remember about me when I'm no longer on this earth. My grandpa has a life story posted on a website that is an amazing memorial of his life. You can view it here http://www.lifestorynet.com/memories/89014.
Whoever is able to write about someones life and stir emotion from their friends and family because of the truth in it, is quite a talented individual. I am definitely not a writer so I think I would be forced to use bullet points. It poses the question as to what is important for my family to remember about me. I hope its things like-- Kind. Fun. Loves family. Plays Super Mario Bros with sons. Flies kites on windy days. Lets kids splash in puddles. Never goes to bed angry. Encouraging wife. Makes a mouthwatering cheesecake. Will they remember what perfume that I wore? The sound of my voice? I guess all of this just makes me want a family portrait even more as we don't have a good family picture. I could just kick myself for not getting someone to take one when the twins were babies. Now I will have to fight two wild and crazy 2 year olds and a 5 year old that suddenly doesn't remember how to smile his normal smile when a camera is brought out. I will have to say I do like this "digital age" that we live in as it is much easier to keep track of some of the everyday things that occur with just a picture or two. I love the ability to quickly delete the bad pictures as well. That being said, I hope to put together some digital scrapbooks through Costco or Shutterfly so that I can be sure to write down some of the everyday things. The funny comments my kids say. Things that make us, "us". I want the everyday pictures with the snotty noses (I know, eww) and dirty feet. I want to remember the way things are and how things felt because family is the most important thing that I have and I want to remember it as best as I can. And if I can't remember it because I have "old-timers", well, I want to be able to read about it.