Gloria Marie Osborne

Gloria Marie Osborne
 
11/3/2018 - She went home today…
 
Today at around 11:30 or so, my Mother stopped doing what we all do from the day we are born.  She stopped breathing.  I had been there maybe 30-45 minutes earlier listening to her practice stopping.  I knew she was going to go soon but I thought maybe tomorrow, maybe the next day, maybe next week; I knew it would probably be today.  I didn’t want to go; I didn’t want to stay; Hospice had already laid her out on the bed, bare to the world as she was the day she arrived, covered under a blanket, head against a pillow but not really on it, mouth wide open and taking shallow breaths.
 
I didn’t realize while I was there, she looked just like Grandma after she left, Uncle Bill, Aunt Sybil… all them had passed and all of them left the same way. But I left; I had to – there was nothing really to do; I prayed over her - half afraid the Lord would ignore me because I haven’t been all that devout and I didn’t want him to be angry with her on my behalf.  I know of course that he would never be that petty and that despite my own shriveled soul he still loves me too.  I told her I love her – though she didn’t even flutter her eyes. I held her hand and I hugged her and I kissed her forehead which was the only part of her still warm to the touch. I told her it was ok to go home now; she could go to rest and wake up young; she could run to her Father and her Mother and she could run and walk and dance again.  I told her to go and I called my brothers to give them a chance to say goodbye and say the same things; we all needed to do that.  And yes I was petty and mean to her Life Partner because I was in pain and his pain didn’t matter.  Someday I hope I will become worthy of myself and get over the crap that makes me less than I can be.
 
Gloria Marie Jenz was born in St. Louis Missouri in 1930 to Karl Ferdinand Jenz and Josephine – my Grandfather and Grandmother.  She was their first born child as I am her first born child.  She lived a suburban St. Louis childhood and in time she met and married my Father Lyman Oscar Randolph.  Together they brought 5 boys into the world, though two of them, my twin and my little brother’s twin did not live through birth.  Together I and my two brothers, Karl Gregory and Keith Edward raised heck as all boys do and became part of my grandmother’s brood of 8 grandsons.
 
When I was about 10 or so my Mother and my Father transferred my two brothers and I to Tucson, Arizona where we all completed growing up and creating lives of our own.  Somewhere along the way, Mom and Dad discovered that they no longer wanted to be part of each other’s lives and parted ways. 
 
Mom never became rich; she never became successful – at least not in the ordinary sense of the term; she didn’t just wander off to the sunset and live life happily forever after without drama.  She had many roller coaster events; she rose and sometimes she fell.  She had moments in the Sun and then sometimes she had moments of darkness.  I’m not writing this to talk about all of that; it’s not the real story of who she was; the real story of who she was could be a comic book about a minuscule 98 pound spindly little woman who could not be beat down.  She broke a hip one year and didn’t let it stop her; she healed up and got up walking again.  She broke the other hip the next year and pushed on again.  She broke her neck another time – that didn’t stop her.  Time and again she overcame the tiny frail vehicle her body had become and kept on going.  I’d call her Super Woman but her real name would be what everyone who really knew her called her - “Glo”.  No matter how dark the day or how deep the pit she found herself in Mom always rose above her troubles and renewed herself like a new day; the sun always rises again, bringing new light and new hope for another beginning and so did Mom.
 
So, tonight I sit here feeling sorry for myself; Mom has gone away; I have loved her; I have hated her; I have worshiped her; I have run from her; but like the sun tomorrow she will rise again and I will see her light and all will be well.  I love you Mom and I am so glad we shared our lives together; I can only hope in the end my eulogy will be half as amazing as yours.  Good night little girl, tomorrow is a new day!