♪ Skyfall ♪

Last Wednesday, at the prompting of my heart and spirit, I flew to my father's home state to arrive at his birthplace.

The next two days I spent caring for, praying for,  and about with his younger sister, on hospice. The little sister of whom he was jealous ...and it turns out he had a right to be.

At the end of HER life, her children, friends, and community  love her and looked after her in return for her years of dedication to their father and to them. 

Barbara Ann. My phantom aunt. HA not her fault that she remained a shadowy figure for years to us, since she lived in Michigan, and we never ventured further than Colorado on summer vacations. Apparently, 1300 miles one way was our limit. As a preschooler, my over-imaginative self thought she was the girl on the bread trucks. Hey. They had the same name. (And the same hair). HA ( I KNEW she wasn't the girl on the beach boys' song, since I don't think she ever wore a bikini, nor hung around  Doheny - or any other CA beach. )

The youngest of the three in my dad's family, she measured a model of strength to me. 

Stalwart, steady, rarely  venturing out of her hometown save for the occasional trip to Detroit  or to Ann Arbor to shop.  One of those was to fly her father's funeral in 1977. We had the odd family occurrence of a funeral AND wedding all in one week. When the life celebrations had passed, we took her to see the Pacific Ocean along the Santa Barbara coast. Fitting, I think, looking back. She radiated sheer joy to wade among the waves, barefoot, slacks rolled up to her knees, feeling the sand and seashells in between her toes. 

A letter my dad wrote to MY mother, back  in college, talked of that same glee, a young Barb who propped up her senior portraits all over the house, to include one against the toaster, so that wherever she went, she could gaze upon her smiling self.  Typical big brother, squashing little sister joy. Sigh. ;-)

That same girl stayed with another family in Hillsdale while her folks moved back to Blissfield, for the duration of her senior year so that she could take languages and get a better education than in the little hamlet where she was born -and would remain. 

Dad probably harbored envy because she had a firm grasp on what eluded him. Barb lived a contented life. Smitten by a local high school football star, an All-State ranked player, she'd gone off to college dreaming big dreams. 

Quitting in her undergrad years to be with her fiancé , who had big dreams of his own, a football star for Michigan state. Most tragically, he was savagely attacked in his dorm room and suffered brain damage. She went to him and never left his side. A once bright young man, now limited to the ranks of the working class. Barb worked as a secretary for a Realtor, making slim ends meet, with my cousin Linda making dinner for dad and two younger brothers while her mom finished up long workdays. 

Barbara Ann.  Her middle name may  have been homage to her grandmother, Anna, a little slip of a thing standing in a starched blouse and crinoline skirt, hair pulled back tight. Squinting through spectacles intense humid June heat, in a photograph from a 1922 family picnic. The Peter were precise and practical farm folk - sending registration forms for such events to get a head count. Necessary practicality - the 1922 photo shows upwards of 100 people stretching over four generations. Barb followed the family precision. 

Started a career as the town librarian when her oldest had graduated high school and her youngest was 8, a career that her friends and neighbors will talk to you about to this day. Some of them have saved certificates earned by their children in her summer reading programs! They'll tell you she was strict and sometimes stern at the library, but that she loved the kids who loved to read like she did.

Yep, that's my aunt Barb. Necessarily practical to a fault. Pretty disciplined, indeed, she was the kind of housekeeper who, when she went into labor with my cousin Bruce, stayed at home until she finished up the supper dishes. Then it was time to go.

I had a hard time leaving her on Saturday, even though she had slipped into the end stages. We weren't close through the years,  but in her lay the last vestiges of my long-gone grandparents, aunt, and father -- and the lady who loved the beach that day in 1977. Sigh.

Got on the plane to go home and the opening of the in-flight movie of the day made me weep a little. "Skyfall". James Bond doesn't ordinarily induce tears. But having seen the film already, knowing an ancestral estate Played an important plot point...the lyric to the theme got me. 

"This is the end Hold your breath and count to ten Feel the earth move and then Hear my heart burst again

For this is the end I've drowned and dreamt this moment So overdue I owe them Swept away, I'm stolen

Let the sky fall When it crumbles We will stand tall Face it all together...

Let the sky fall We will stand tall At skyfall"

I did the dishes at your house, Aunt Barb, straightened things, up, and left it nice so you'd be ready to go, for the last time... :-), and on Sunday afternoon, you did.

We will stand tall, with your kids and granddaughters, and beloved widower, while their sky falls, today. 

Give everyone a hug for us...