Nini

Me & Nini

Ritual comes in the form of what we repeat with intention.

I recently planned a memorial service for my grandmother Laura.

In my parents' sun room, we hung a portrait of a hummingbird.

I stood beneath it and read this eulogy:

Laura Alice Allen Yarbrough, affectionately known as Nini, spent 81 years alive on this earth. The time I remember her best was here in Rome, Georgia, taking me on after school adventures, falling asleep (against my orders) during movies, giving tours of the plants in her yard and making sure that everyone had enough to eat. She had a bold sense of humor and a level of social and academic intelligence which surpassed the norms of her time, especially for women.  Her final years of life centered on the challenge to take ownership of her own healthcare. In many ways, she succeeded in this. Nonetheless, her body still had its final say, and she gracefully released her soul to become part of whatever exists outside our human perception on August 24, 2017. While this process always comes with some level of sadness and regret, it also comes with joy and gratitude. All life is a fleeting part of a much greater whole, and death the natural culmination of life.  In addition to whatever cosmic form her energy now takes, Nini's spirit will continue to live through everyone she has ever touched. Together now, we carry forward her story with a focus on gentleness, transition, change, hope and love.

Then I played the same TerraPan I used the day she died. I had looked inside her mind that day and felt hummingbirds there. I also heard her tell me to go get my instrument and play, to push through the barriers my mother thought were placed by the men in her family.

On the other side of the glass, the day of the memorial, we made a garden and dedicated it in Nini's honor. We will pass the seashell-filled bird bath down through generations.

My daughter painted a bird house, and everyone there marked it, signing our names: Kelli, Don, Susan, Ryan, Clinton, Kyra Lena and Val.

It always feels like there will be more.