[Magdalen] RIP Sir Terry Pratchett

[James Oppenheimer-Crawford]

That's a marvelous story ! ! !

Folks challenge me why I still believe in God.  Those kinds of things,
going on all the time are why; they are essentially angels giving a
message, something greater than mere coincidence is here.

James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
*“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy

On Fri, Mar 13, 2015 at 5:36 PM, Jay Weigel <jay.weigel at gmail.com> wrote:

> I have known several people, among them my father, who waited until family
> were all out of the room before they died. Or perhaps all family except
> their spouse or closest family member. This has even occurred when the
> person was for all intents and purposes comatose.
>
> My mother, on the other hand, departed in a different manner. She had
> caught a respiratory bug that had been making the rounds, and because we'd
> elected not to have her hospitalized, she was being given oral antibiotics
> at home. She wasn't getting better and we knew it was probably the end. The
> sitter called my daughter, and she and her husband came over. Mom was
> tucked up in her bed and Betsy and Jonathan prayed with her and then he
> left the room. Betsy found some swing music on the radio and she said Mom
> smiled and closed her eyes. Betsy laid her head down on the bed next to
> Mom's and she said Mom just gradually stopped breathing, but she didn't
> stop smiling until she was gone. I suspect my dad had come to get her.
>
> On Fri, Mar 13, 2015 at 4:33 PM, James Oppenheimer-Crawford <
> oppenheimerjw at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > It seems most of the stories I have heard were along the lines of, "I had
> > just stepped out of the room to <get a meal/get some air/talk with a
> > MD/etc.> and in those moments he left." People seem to prefer to leave
> when
> > others are not present.  Your parents must have had a close and
> supportive
> > relationship.
> >
> > The deaths in my family have generally been following a period of
> complete
> > non-responsiveness.
> >
> > And yet: Helen, my dear mother-in-law, lay for days in a coma, and then
> > died on the same date as her beloved Vince died several years before.  It
> > wasn't until after she plugged her mother's birth and death dates into
> her
> > genealogy program that Christine realized this.
> >
> > James W. Oppenheimer-Crawford
> > *“A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved,
> > except in memory. LLAP**”  -- *Leonard Nimoy
> >
> > On Fri, Mar 13, 2015 at 2:46 PM, Scott Knitter <scottknitter at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > On Fri, Mar 13, 2015 at 12:07 PM, ME Michaud <michaudme at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> > > > I sat with my mother as she was dying and I was ASTONISHED at
> > > > the similarities with labor and childbirth. Many years later I had a
> > > > friend who was a doula, and she said the same. Her father's dying
> > > > was more like childbirth than she ever would have imagined.
> > >
> > > I wasn't with my dad when he died, but my mom was. She was about to
> > > help him prepare to go to dinner, and he was found to have simply and
> > > silently departed. I know it depressed him to realize he was in the
> > > nursing home (a quite nice one) permanently; I like to think he looked
> > > around and decided life wasn't going to get better than that, his dear
> > > wife was there, and he somehow consented to (or nodded yes to a call
> > > to) step through the veil.
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > Scott R. Knitter
> > > Edgewater, Chicago, Illinois USA
> > >
> >
>