A New Year

Spring officially arrives today.  I see evidence of new life, lots of it -- crocus and daffodils are up, grass is greening, buds are on the trees.  And I have a lot of catching-up to do here.  I'm lucky to be alive.  So lucky.  More so than usual.

In October last year, as part of our Tour de Johnston, Shannon and I visited nieces, nephews, cousins and siblings around the Midwest, notably my brother Gene in his Evansville, Indiana nursing home.  Gene was 89 then, nineteen years older than me; I had not seen him for several years. 

He died a month later.

I myself damn near died in December/January, from streptococcal pneumonia and meningitis, right after my birthday, Christmas Day.  Spent a week in ICU sedated and intubated on the ventilator, stewing in a mix of high-powered antibiotics.  And I survived.  It has now taken me the better part of ten weeks to regain my strength.  But I survived.

Then, sorry to say, earlier this month, my dear sister and my veritable second mother Marie suffered a stroke.  She died a few days after.

It's almost as if the Johnston siblings (the three out of four remaining; my sister Wanda died 17 years prior) -- almost as if we had collectively reached the end of our shelf life within a few months of each other.  (Yah, I know I could have said Our Expiration Date.  Bad pun.)

I've always been the baby, born eleven years after Wanda, 15 after Marie, 19 after Gene, who was off fighting WWII in the Pacific, late 1943 when I straggled onto the scene.

Now I'm the only one left, sole surviving sibling, and it's a lonesome feeling.

My earliest auditory memory is of hearing mourning doves; I'm two years old or three, sitting on the steps of the old family home, 1112 North 19th St, Mattoon, Illinois.  After her funeral last Saturday when we returned to the house Marie had shared with Marvin Moore for many of their 68 years together, the mourning doves were again active.  Marie is buried within sight of that house on North 19th St.