I got a call in the middle of the night from Trevor. I saw the clock and it was 1:30am. I thought it was an accident and just sent it to voicemail. As I looked closer at my phone, I had a bunch of messages. At first, I thought something had happened to Bill, but then I saw a text from him, so I knew something was up with Mom.
I called Trevor back, and he told me that Mom had passed away on a trip to Colorado with Bill. They were at a concert and she went to the bathroom. She was gone for a long time, so they went to see if she was ok and found her in the stall leaning against the wall. They did everything they could, but in the end, she was gone. They think it was a heart attack. Everyone is in shock. She seemed to be really healthy.
To be honest, it seemed like a good way to go. She was traveling and doing something fun with friends. The last few years have been full of travel and doing her Operation Smile trips. Our relationship was complicated, but it was a hard weekend to say goodbye.
We decided to stay a few weeks, like we always do. The first week was all prep for mom’s funeral. We got a bunch of stuff of hers and set up a memory wall. It was a good representation of who she was. We did the viewing Thursday. It was extremely hard for me to see Mom in the casket. Amber asked me to do the dressing the day before and I just couldn’t do it. Good friends showed up which was nice.
The day of the funeral was a beautiful fall day. We spoke at the church and cried until our eyeballs hurt. The grave site was overlooking the valley. Her casket was wooden and everyone painted their hand white and put their print on it. Kevin had the idea to bring a stensil of a rose so we did a yellow rose for Blakely to be a part of it. As they lowered the casket, we all sang “Let’s go fly a kit” which seemed appropriate. She loved that song.
The next few days were rough. All of us felt super lost. We had been so structured with time and details then it was a void of nothing… We all ended up at Trevor’s for Sunday dinner and I think we were all so fried we could hardly make conversation.
Hi-D and the Girls
Monday Morning, we went down to Plesent Grove and helped Hi-D (Ben’s sister) with her house. Her and her husband are recently separated and I’ll do this as a service for those I love. It was a good get away and distraction from the week before. We spent 3 days cleaning, organizing, and chatting. It was great! On Thursday my dad came to pick me up and bring me back to SLC to help Amber and Bill put Moms stuff away that we used for the display. Ben is going down to LV to see a concert that he has been excited about for almost a year!
As I went back to mom’s house all the exhausted feeling came back, and I finally felt the tiredness catch up with me.
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