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The Death of My Titia
The Inevitable Death of A Loved One
How do we accept and rationalize that someone we love is eventually going to die? How is it possible to live knowing that person will be gone and you may never see them again?
I would often think about my Titia’s death years before her actual death. I couldn’t imagine my life without her. I would be driving home from visiting her and tears would fall down my face. At that time, she was still very much alive. She still had a twinkle in her eyes and a smile that lit up her beautiful wrinkled face. But she no longer could garden or crochet, and she couldn’t walk without falling. The doctor said she needed a wheelchair. She was in her nineties and I knew I wouldn’t have her for much longer. And, one day I would lose her.
I was the only one who called her Titia, which means “aunty”. My mother, her sister, was alive and well and lived a few blocks from us. But we all knew I belonged with my Titia. As a child, I often wondered why my mother had straight hair and Titia and I were the only ones with curly hair.
Her name was Maria. She was kind and generous to everyone. Sometimes her husband would fight with her about me. He didn’t want me living in his house. I was not his daughter — not his responsibility. They had two daughters of their own. I needed to go and live with my own…
