Hello everyone, thanks for dropping by.
Feb 9, 2010
A year has gone by and mom is loved and missed by many. After much reflection and time that has passed there are a few thoughts I wish to pass along. Mom kept things simple. Know what true satisfaction is. Offering others what you have to give and that is "time'. Find meaning in your life, devote yourself to loving others and devote yourself to something that gives you purpose and meaning. Don't show off at the people at the top, they will look down on you anyhow. Don't try to impress people at the bottom they will only envy you. Only an open heart will allow you to float equally between everyone. Giving to other people is what makes us feel alive. Helping someone smile after feeling sad is a healthy as you will ever feel. Do the kinds of things that come from the heart. Mom is alive because love stays alive, even though she is gone. We are all creatures of the same forest. What is taken needs replenished. Build a community of those you love and who love you. In the beginning of life when we are infants we need others to survive, right? At the end of life you need others to be alive. But here's a secret: In between, we need others as well.
Love to all.............Heath
MOST CURRENT INFORMATION 2/16/2009
At the bottom of the page are the songs played at the celebration of Mom's life. "Click," sit back and put on your boogie shoes. The other option is to close your eyes, put a smile on your face and simply enjoy dancing barefoot in the rain as mom did!
As requested, here is the eulogy that I gave for Mom. It was an honor and privilege to do this, and Mom is proud of the spirit in which the service took place. It was a mixture of tears, laughter and pride. There was fun music and very heart-felt music. Who says Jimmy Buffet can't be played in church? What a way to go out. I will keep the blog open. Feel free to add comments or stories.
Much love to all and keep the faith...........Heath
Welcome Republicans.........Democrats need to find a seat in the back somewhere.
First, I would really like to thank all of you who came to visit, called, emailed, blogged and prayed for Mom during the four weeks we were at the hospital. I would like to thank all the priests for coming up. As stated in the blog, Mom was always one to cover her bases. “Can never be too sure," she’d say, followed by a huge giggle. I was really getting paranoid because every time I looked over my shoulder, there was a priest. I finally looked up to the heavens, and then I looked at Mom, and I said, “I get the point you two, now stop already."
I hope in heaven there are no cars. My mother has not had the best luck with cars. I remember sometime back, we were at a fair. There were two trees in the middle of the field, and 200 yards on each side and only approximately eight feet in between. Mom makes a decision that amounts to what I think in her mind was like kicking a field goal. She put a smile on her face and said to herself “I can do it.” So I said "hut, hut, hike" and mom proceeded to drive that car right between the uprights. Imagine kicking a ball between uprights as wide as the ball itself. No room for error, right? So as the car proceeded between the two uprights, the car was doing fine as the front part passed through the trees, but then came the doors. That’s where the problem began. She put two very beautiful new stripes that had a touch of oak finish on both sides of the car. All she did was laugh at herself.
I remember another time riding in the car. I was very small kid, maybe 4 or 5. We were in downtown Indianapolis. We turned onto a four-lane road, but there was one problem. It was one-way road, we were going the wrong way, and as I looked up, we were now playing chicken. Me and Mom against four lanes of oncoming traffic. And what came to mind is something I can NOT repeat to you in this church, nor could I at 5 years of age in front of Mom. Not cool. What was not cool either was the decision she made next. She made a hard right and ended up going onto the sidewalk. And I just dropped to the floor in hopes no one would see me. So we went from driving against oncoming cars… to oncoming human beings. Somehow we got the car turned around; no cars were lost nor any human beings. Mom just laughed at herself and giggled through the entire experience.
After Mom passed away we all had our cries, hugs, and meltdowns. Peggy decided to leave just a bit earlier than the rest of us. The three of us sat in a room reflecting, pondering, and dreaming, not saying too much, and the phone rings. Guess who? It is Peggy; she is on I-70 and has run out of gas. The thought that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree came to mind. It takes me about 15-20 minutes to get there, and as I am driving, I notice the rain. And I mean I really notice the rain in a way I haven’t noticed before. I immediately have a little smile on my face as I think about rain and mom, reflecting back to her 50th birthday. I had made the decision to take mom out on the town in Indianapolis. We proceeded to a comedy club and then to a dance club. Problem: There was a hurricane outside. I remember driving, and it was raining so hard that I literally could only drive 5 mph and could barely see anything in front of me. I was saying "This totally is not cool," and I looked back at Mom (I looked back because looking forward didn’t matter too much anyway, because I couldn’t see anyway!). When I looked in the rearview mirror, there was Mom chewing her gum with a big smile on her face saying, “This is so much fun on my 50th. I have lightening, explosions and hail. I feel so special!!!" With mom it was always the simple things and the little things she appreciated. Her perspective was about simple pleasures in life. As stated, she was a person who rarely failed to notice the smell of rose, the crackle of a bonfire, or the hush of a morning; she relished in it. She found rainstorms exciting and skipped and said they are fun and exhilarating when you let it be. She would say, “When you walk outside and it’s zero degrees, yes! The shock is kind of exciting! I really feel alive." Again, I go back to her feeling the simple pleasures in life. I had an algebra teacher that would have us work these long problems on the board. I would work the whole problem and miss adding or subtracting something easy, and I would get the whole problem wrong and he would look at me and say, "It’s the simple things in life that matter." Mom has taught us all through her example to take time for simple pleasures. This will bring real joy to your life.
I might wonder if she held on for four weeks to teach us one more lesson, and that’s to develop endless compassion for people. I realized this as the end was getting close. Mom would say, taking from people makes you feel like you're dying…..giving makes you feel like you're living. It’s a profound little sentence, and besides, it rhymes: Giving makes you feel like you're living. You know it’s true because the opposite is false. Taking never makes you feel alive. Sure it’s the basis of materialism, capitalism and we buy all these things and we think we are going to live forever. Think about it. In the movies, any movie, when the patriarch is about to die…. and in his last scene… in his final words…..in his final breath do they ever utter a sentence like, "Bring me that big-screen television and let me touch it one last time.” No, you laugh because it’s preposterous.
Now think about that real moment that all of us are going to face. In that final moment all that you own is of no use to you. All that you’ve purchased and acquired brings no comfort. Chances are it’s not even in the room with you. It’s in the garage. It’s in the basement or a bank vault. (One thing is for sure, it ain't in our 401k.)
In that final drop of sand through the hourglass, all that matters is that the people who you love are there with you, holding your hand, and you can look them in the eye and tell them how you feel about them. Then what makes you think in all the other drops through the hour glass….that’s not the most important thing too. In high school they taught us that there are millions and millions of grains of sand on a beach and you can’t tell one from another, right? The one that is dropping through your hour glass now as you're listening to me is the same one that’s gonna drop with your last breath. And what’s going to be important in that last one is what’s important now. We just don’t believe it, because we all think we have endless sand. Mom has taught me that we don’t have endless sand and the way you feel alive is by giving. So today, tomorrow, next week, next month……carry mom’s legacy. I ask you to begin to give or to think of giving.
Story: There were these two guys who were great friends. Student/teacher relationship. The teacher was dying and he asked the favor of the student. The student said sure. Teacher says, "I want you to come by and visit my grave when I am gone." He said, "Not the way other people do it, by leaving the car engine running, putting some flowers down, going back to the car and going home. I want you to come when you have some time. Bring a blanket, bring some sandwiches, plan on sticking around a while and I want you to talk to me…about your life, your problems." The student says "Wait a minute, let me get this straight. You want me to come to a cemetery, bring a picnic at your tombstone and talk to the air." The teacher said, "Exactly." The student says "It won’t be like we are talking now, because you won’t be able to talk back." The teacher says "I will make you a deal. After I am gone, you talk and I will listen."
Mom had this down to an art. Many, if not all of us, experienced this with her. The one trait mom had was her ability to listen to a story, problems or just rambling. Trust me when I say that because I am forty and she has been doing it for me for 40 years. If you talk she would listen. That is the essence of everything she tried to teach me through the years and by example. This is the essence of what I’m trying to say to you today and the essence of why you all are here is simply this: If you lead your life with people, making time for people, helping people with their problems, THEN when you're gone, you're not 100% gone. You live on. Because mom lived her life by this rule, she is living on inside the hearts and minds of everyone she touched. And, she can talk to you, not because of some funky ghosts or weird séances, but because my mom spent time putting herself inside people. Her voice is inside them, the memories are inside them.
Its like a penny in a piggy bank. You put the penny in the piggy bank and for all intents and purposes, the penny is gone, right? You can’t see it, right? Now take the bank and you shake it and there it is—always there, the sound, the voice and one life touching another, touches another that touches another. And as I stated in the blog, death may end the life but does not end the relationship….the relationship goes on because, just like mom, she vested in it while she was here. If you think that is a corny way for a corny speaker to wrap up then …why are you here? It is my hope, my prayer, that I vest time in people so that when my sand through the hourglass drops, I too will live on…just like mom.
And because mom vested time in people, one life touched another that touched another that touched another.
I will end with a joke. There are two waves in the ocean, a he wave and a she wave. They were flippin' and floppin' around, and all of a sudden, the he wave panics because it sees the shore. "What’s the matter," the she wave says? He wave says "Look, couple more flips and we are going to hit the shore and that’s going to be the end of it and we will disappear. This is terrible…couple more flips and we’re nothing." The she wave calmly says to the he wave , “You don’t understand. You're not just a wave, you're part of the ocean. Today you are all a part of the ocean and being moved in this big pool of humanity by a very, very, very, very, very, very charismatic, important, significant wave that is my mother's spirit of giving.
Stated by a dear friend : One of my greatest hopes in life is that our children will feel the kind of love from their partners that Ann must’ve felt from Stan.
We thank mom for the example she has set, the life she lived, and the love she gave. As you all know, Dad is not your typical Hallmark Channel man, not some Sensitive New Age Guy who embraces his emotions and his feminine side and cries when a flower blooms. So much more powerful, then, the understanding of the depth of love that he feels for his precious Ann. To see a strong, "old-school," true MAN so completely affected, so completely in love... I can't begin to describe it, but it's truly the stuff of epic love stories, and it will change me forever. And I couldn’t agree more. The world is a better now because there is a little bit of Granann in each of us…. and may we continue to carry on her legacy. On behalf of my family, I thank you, I thank you, and I thank you for all the love, support and prayers. I leave these thoughts with you in the name of our savior Jesus the Christ.
Amen!
All my love……Heath
Update, From Heath:
Mom passed away this evening. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you for all the support during the last four weeks. All the calls, prayers, emails, blogs and visits have been so supportive and gave much comfort during this most difficult time. Let us NOT mourn her death. Let us celebrate her LIFE. Death may end a life but let it NOT end the relationship. We are all better today and forever because their is a little bit of ANN in each of us. I know Mom is dancing in Heaven's rain with a smile and her boogie shoes on.
Keep the faith
Love to all.............Heath
Update, From Peggy:
Heath is out of town and unable to update this blog, and I know some of you are depending on it for information.
I'm sorry to say that it appears that Mom is just not going to get better. She has been neurologically flat since she arrived at the hospital four weeks ago. She has shown no real signs of consciousness. The doctor we met with Monday told us that he had never known a patient Mom's age with her degree of brain damage and lack of consciousness make any recovery.
As Heath said, Mom has always been full of life and never wanted to be alive but not living. She never wanted to be in a nursing home or kept alive while permanently incapacited, and she made this wish well known to Dad and us all. We will honor that wish. The tubes supplying her air will be removed Monday morning. She may survive for some period but she will not survive for long. It is truly time for us all to say goodbye to her physical presence in our life. And I know how difficult that goodbye will be.
“Grief is the price we pay for love.” I keep thinking of that memorable line in a speech given by Queen Elizabeth. I know that the many people who post or read this blog will feel deep grief over this news. I think that the grief we experience will be generated from the love she has lavished on us all. I am amazed at the number of people with whom she has kept in contact, some over many, many years in addition to all the people in Terre Haute who have known and loved her – and were loved by her. She was a great writer, sending out regular e-mails to so many people, but she was also a great listener, with a genuine curiousity and desire to share in others’ lives and to be there for them when they needed an ear.
I am also thinking of another quote, “The opposite of life is not death, but indifference.” As we have said in other posts, Mom was a person who embraced and found joy in the everyday experience, in the small pleasures. I would like to think that is a gift we can carry forward in our own lives. That we will all dance in the rain. We will take pleasure in the sound of a thunderstorm, the sight of a bonfire, the story well told, the perfect tennis shot, the hug of a child, the gathering of loved ones. I haven’t “felt” her presence in her body for some time, but I do feel that somewhere, somehow, she is still there, still watching over us. Stacey, she is listening. Jane, she was with you on that mountaintop. Nilah, she is probably hoping you won’t tell TOO many stories! (But can we talk later?) And I think she is taking comfort in the love between us all who have shared stories and expressed love on this blog, and who have gathered at her bedside over the last four weeks. Her love has been a sustaining force in our family, so our grief is great, mine not least as I had way too few years with her, but all of you have helped to make it bearable. God bless you all.
We will post again next week.
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I apologize for not updating. I have been sick with the flu bug all week. So the latest is mom really hasn't shown any signs of neurological improvement. The physicians are giving us two options. Option 1, trach and a peg. Option 2, is remove all life support. Unfortunately we are at the crossroads where we had no intention of being. Sometimes nature makes decisions for you good or bad. Sometimes nature takes a back seat and for us this seems to be the case. It was my mom's wishes not to be in a long term health facility in bed alive BUT NOT LIVING. We will give a little more time but the hope of a full to partial recovery seems distant and unlikely. Thank you for all the hope, prayers, and comments on the blog. I love reading the stories.
Love to all...........Heath
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Since they took her off the sedation yesterday mom openened her eyes frequently today. Yesterday she actually turned her head about 3-4 inches to the right and looked at dad with eyes wide open. It is hard to say exactly how to interperate this but remain cautiously optimistic. She doesn't follow commands, "yet" however opens and blinks eyes with what appears to be lack of focus. Other Neurological checks remain the same. The cooling catheter that was placed in her blood was turned off today because she has been able to regulate her body temperature appropriately. The analogy is like air conditioned blood to keep the body temperature down. As for the pneumonia they take chest xrays daily. So far so good. This could change, her being immobile and on a vent poses a real risk. We continue talking to her daily and the ipod playing with her favorite music. We did a recording of all the grandkids talking to her and put it on the ipod for mom to hear. The cheers are loud and clear! Fight, fight,fight!!!!
Dad is attending church in morning and will be there 1:00pm. I will be there 1:30 ish.
Keep the faith and keep praying!
Love to all........Heath
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The ipod is playing and she is hearing her favorite music. I told her to put on "my, my, boogie shoes" baby and dance her way into a full recovery. They will do a CT scan Monday. I am sure she imagines skipping in the rain and great sunsets in the future. It is the weekend, please lift your glass and give a toast in hope for a full recovery. So I raise my glass and say that life comes down to family and friends....cheers to both!! Thanks to for the blogs, visits, and prayers.
Everything remains the same.
Keep the faith and keep praying!!
Love to all......Heath
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I'd like to thank all those who have emailed and posted comments on the blog. It is comforting and therapeutic for us to read and the stories are great. Keep 'em coming!!
To all the St. Luke people in Shelbyville, thanks so much for the support. We left Shelbyville in 1977 physically but the relationships with mom were constant and dear to mom's heart. Runyons rock!! Bill & Linda Mac thank you. The St. George gang has been very supportive and I know mom is smiling inside, knowing all who have emailed, called or come to see her. Special thanks to Anita for the Republican prayer. :).. My sister Peggy and Dad are on phones now to rally the Democrats. We will take prayers even from Democrats. HA! The tenacious tennis ladies, thank you for the basket. Tennis is mom's passion. I have tried to get mom to close her mouth when attempting an overhead. I'm not giving up. To my buddies who she spoke highly of in the Christmas letter. Brad, Sean, Mark, Mike, thanks for all the calls and visits. And with all the priests coming up, mom always is one to cover all bases. Thanks to the entire Sego family for your prayers. Mom Sego and my mom spent long hours praying that Sean, Brad and I would make it out of the teenage years alive. Please continue with the comments and especially the prayers. Words cannot express the support and love. Keep the faith.
Love to all......Heath
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For more on cerebral aneurysms, look here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerebral_aneurysm.
