My Aunt Millie
Dec. 19th, 2009 07:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maisfeekaI just found out that my Aunt Millie died last night.
It seems so fast and sudden. It wasn't even a week ago that mom said she'd been told Aunt Millie had been in the hospital and wasn't doing well. And Friday when I saw my mom she apologized and said she hoped I wasn't mad at her because she and my dad had gone down to see her on Thursday and I'd asked to go with them if they went, but it was all very last minute. Mom said she wasn't doing well at all - just a few moments of lucidness and lots of pain. But she was sure Aunt Millie had said 'I love you' when my mom leaned in to kiss her and I'm sure she did too.
And tonight at the end of my niece's basketball game, mom leaned in and said she'd heard just before she came over that Aunt Millie had died last night.
She's actually my great aunt, my beloved Vovo's sister. All my childhood my Vovo took my cousin, Jacquie, and I to New Bedford with her and my grandfather and we'd spend nearly two weeks with the New Bedford relatives, including my grandmother's two sisters, Aunt Millie and Aunt Addy. My Vovo died almost 10 years ago, Aunt Addy a few years ago and Aunt Millie was the last.
She was a hot ticket. She was a real estate agent when I was younger and used to let Jacquie and I go with her when she showed houses sometimes, and whenever we were out with her, regardless of the time of day, we always had to stop at Friendly's to have a hot fudge sundae 'for her mother's soul'. She insisted that Vovo Borges had loved hot fudge sundaes and that it was the best way to remember her.
She was the only Republican in a whole family of Democrats and I remember one year when I was really tiny they jokingly locked her out of the little downstairs bar my Aunt Addy and Uncle Marty had in their house and she always reminded me of how I was so upset for her that I insisted that I was a 'Publican too so I could be with her and she wouldn't be all alone.
She told me a story once of how when she was a young girl, a cousin of hers, very young, had died in her presence. Aunt Millie said the girl had a very high fever and nothing the parents or doctor did helped and that she would always remember that just before she died the girl started calling out "Que lindo! Que lindo!" (It's beautiful!) and saying she saw the angels and that Aunt Millie had never been afraid of death since then.
My mom's cousin said that this week during one of her lucid moments Aunt Millie said, "Who knew dying would be so much like a party?" and I guess that about sums her up.
In a way she felt like the last link to my grandmother and I hate to think that I'll never see her again. But she lived a good life, 94 or 95 years old, and she got to see her Anthony before she died. I hope that when she passed she was thinking "Que lindo!" too.
And sometime in the next few days I'll make a point of stopping by Friendly's to have a hot fudge sundae for her soul.
Bons Sonyos, Querida.
It seems so fast and sudden. It wasn't even a week ago that mom said she'd been told Aunt Millie had been in the hospital and wasn't doing well. And Friday when I saw my mom she apologized and said she hoped I wasn't mad at her because she and my dad had gone down to see her on Thursday and I'd asked to go with them if they went, but it was all very last minute. Mom said she wasn't doing well at all - just a few moments of lucidness and lots of pain. But she was sure Aunt Millie had said 'I love you' when my mom leaned in to kiss her and I'm sure she did too.
And tonight at the end of my niece's basketball game, mom leaned in and said she'd heard just before she came over that Aunt Millie had died last night.
She's actually my great aunt, my beloved Vovo's sister. All my childhood my Vovo took my cousin, Jacquie, and I to New Bedford with her and my grandfather and we'd spend nearly two weeks with the New Bedford relatives, including my grandmother's two sisters, Aunt Millie and Aunt Addy. My Vovo died almost 10 years ago, Aunt Addy a few years ago and Aunt Millie was the last.
She was a hot ticket. She was a real estate agent when I was younger and used to let Jacquie and I go with her when she showed houses sometimes, and whenever we were out with her, regardless of the time of day, we always had to stop at Friendly's to have a hot fudge sundae 'for her mother's soul'. She insisted that Vovo Borges had loved hot fudge sundaes and that it was the best way to remember her.
She was the only Republican in a whole family of Democrats and I remember one year when I was really tiny they jokingly locked her out of the little downstairs bar my Aunt Addy and Uncle Marty had in their house and she always reminded me of how I was so upset for her that I insisted that I was a 'Publican too so I could be with her and she wouldn't be all alone.
She told me a story once of how when she was a young girl, a cousin of hers, very young, had died in her presence. Aunt Millie said the girl had a very high fever and nothing the parents or doctor did helped and that she would always remember that just before she died the girl started calling out "Que lindo! Que lindo!" (It's beautiful!) and saying she saw the angels and that Aunt Millie had never been afraid of death since then.
My mom's cousin said that this week during one of her lucid moments Aunt Millie said, "Who knew dying would be so much like a party?" and I guess that about sums her up.
In a way she felt like the last link to my grandmother and I hate to think that I'll never see her again. But she lived a good life, 94 or 95 years old, and she got to see her Anthony before she died. I hope that when she passed she was thinking "Que lindo!" too.
And sometime in the next few days I'll make a point of stopping by Friendly's to have a hot fudge sundae for her soul.
Bons Sonyos, Querida.