‘Mama’ was really gone, but a connection with her continued on
By Janai “Grandma Boom” Mestrovich
I was unable to accept her death. “Mama” was my Croatian grandmother. She was warmhearted, gentle and compassionate. Her English was broken. Papa, my Croatian grandfather and husband of Katarina (“Mama”), immigrated to the U.S., worked and built a house in the Croatian Kansas City settlement called Strawberry Hill. It took 11 years before he sent for his betrothed, Katarina, who waited for him outside Zagreb in the farm country.
Before Mama died, I came home to Kansas City from Kansas State University during finals week. She was hospitalized, having contracted a terminal illness from a flu vaccination. When I arrived at the hospital, she had been in a coma for three days. Uncle Mark was sitting in the room with her. He said she had not spoken a word or eaten for three days. He encouraged me to dampen her lips frequently.
I spoke to Mama as though we were just visiting. It was so sad to see her breathing, yet lifeless, in the way I had always known her. It was her giggling that I wanted to hear. When teaching me bread-making, she allowed me to eat as much dough as I wanted, which was a lot. Her giggling made me laugh while I overate dough.
Being in the midst of finals, I could not stay long. When I got up to leave and was saying goodbye to her with a kiss on her forehead, she whispered, with eyes closed, “Don’t go! Don’t go! Don’t go!” Uncle Mark looked shocked, since Mama had not spoken for three days.
The following week Mama died. It was the wake at Skradski’s funeral home that brought the reality home to me that death changes our chemical makeup. I approached the casket. In a moment of sentimental longing, I leaned over and kissed her on the lips, then jerked back from the body. She was stone cold, with lips that felt like cement. Mama was not there anymore. That kiss of death awakened me to a sudden acceptance that she was gone. In an unexpected and odd way, I felt more at peace really knowing that death does bring departure — of the spirit in the body, the energy, the essence of what the person was.
Months later a visitation occurred at midnight Mass Christmas Eve. I was sitting in our family pew with no one sitting to my right. During the Mass, I became very aware that Mama was sitting next to me, invisible, but with a presence that was palpable. Oh, my heart! I didn’t understand what was happening.
Moments passed, and I heard her voice gently speaking into my ear. “I came to give you all the compassion I gained in my life.”
As soon as her words stopped, I felt as though someone was pouring a surge of something warm into the top of my head that then landed smack-dab in the middle of my heart. It felt like a warm expansion that stretched my heart beyond the boundaries of my body. I wanted to thank her, but she was gone as soon as she gave me her gift. Then I sat at the Mass feeling like a saint had blessed me. I spoke about this to no one for many years.
I knew Mama was still alive in some other way than physical and that our love connected us. My mind scrambled to want to say “Thank you,” and my heart longed to feel her once again next to me so that I could hug her in gratitude. I realized compassion would keep us connected. She was a living part of my compassion. It was a kind of inner peace that permeated me in totality, without any more longing for what could not be. The kiss of death awakened me and ushered me into a new phase of life that would bring a kind of inner peace I never could have imagined on my own.
Janai “Grandma Boom” Mestrovich is executive director of Superkid Power Inc. and author, speaker/trainer, pioneer. She teaches human potential skills beginning at age 3 with creative experiences. superkidpower.org or janailow@gmail.com.
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