Let's not talk about it. Let's not think about it.

 Let's not talk about it. Let's not think about it. 

I lost my Mom recently, at the I feel, young age, of thirty-four. I was not equipped even though I knew it was the inevitable from terminal cancer. 

Never in a million years would I have assumed my Mom would have only been in my home on hospice for two weeks. TWO WEEKS. Like other cancer cases I had heard before her, I had anticipated three months. Small Cell Lung Cancer is a quick bitch though. One minute she was with me, then she died three days later. 

What they don't tell you is how death actually happens. First, they talk gibberish, then they go into a semi-coherent coma, screaming weird things like, "You're killing me," my Mother is speaking to my brother, and I. "Why are you two trying to kill me?" 

"Mom we are helping you!" "Ugh" followed by silence. Her screaming random things all night, such as, "More ice!" and "Nina" her older sister that is estranged and still is undiscovered with her whereabouts. 

This night is then followed by an open mouthed and agitated seizure state breathing hard about twelve breaths per minute, that slowly drop to ten, then nine, then eight, then the inevitable. 

My brother whom was unable to be by her dying bedside, showed up upon her death and thought she still had a pulse. 

"Her heart is still beating," my older than myself niece stating, "Listen to her chest if you need to." 

"Shit. Well alright then." 

My Dad is sleeping next to her and making phone calls. She passed around 9:40pm but was declared at 10:17 on the 17th. The same day my brother Ed had died on, just like the brother before him who had died at seventeen.

My Mothers' family stepped forward and dressed her in proper Russian Molokan garb. My estranged family stating it was her birthright even though she did not practice. 

My Mom was beautiful in white. Her body was well intact, compared to my previous brethren and several dead bodies I had once recovered under the Golden Gate. 

I had asked her to text me when she got to the other side if there was an afterlife. I have received no such text. However, the day after I received a call from my husbands' phone while it was unattended. Dismissing such, a day before the funeral a family friend and neighbor, called asking about my Father being in the hospital. When I told him that my Father was fine, he had said he received a string of text messages after turning on his phone. My neighbor, also having cancer issues was unable to make it to the funeral but showed up the next morning. He showed me the text...

"Hey Dan, it's Tosha, Archie is in the hospital." This text was dated from twenty-twenty and had shown up new as unread. 

This is as close as I have gotten to a text. My phone broke the day of the funeral due to a sim card malfunction. The only hope I am holding onto is the fact that possibly my estranged Aunt Nina is deceased, and that is why my Mom called her name. 

However, I always tell myself... death is for the living, not the dead.