Aduladi & Co. and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Want to know the secret to make a big, tough, firefighting Mr. Clean tear up? Make his women cry.

Today was one for the record books. This morning I got "the call" at 08:40 that my beloved Grandmother had finally gone to be with the Creator. She had been discharged to hospice care and allowed to go to her house on Tuesday night as she had been praying for. All she wanted to do was die in her own home and in her sleep. The Lord granted both requests. She died peacefully with two of her four children at her side.

I had the honor of spending 3 days with her a few weeks ago while she was still up and about after she had found out that she was no longer in remission. We went to chemo, went shopping and spent a lot of time just being together. My Grandmother and I had been traveling companions quite a bit and loved spending time together and this was no different. Last weekend I spent a few days and a couple nights in the hospital with her. I knew then that she was waiting to die and desperately wanted to go to her house. She was a completely different person. Still herself and lucid, just ready to stop fighting.

Fast forward to this afternoon. Mr. Clean and I made the tough decision to finally help Al the cat
out of his pain. We planned earlier in the week to take him to the vet today and I almost chickened out a few times and rescheduled. But after the call, I prayed about it and felt quite at ease about the decision we had made to put him down. Even though my grandmother had died as well, it still made sense. The only thought I can come up with to describe it was that it sucked. Majorly. I cried like a two year old the whole time until I wound up with a migraine. Then I came home and laid down for an hour or so while Mr. Clean made dinner and supervised a mini clean up of the downstairs. The whole time he made everyone whisper. The man is a prince.

We had prepared the kids for both deaths and had been talking about them so that the kids wouldn't be thrown for a loop. K.Z. and C'sa had spent a great deal of time with Al today but I did not realize until later that Xena never took her chance. After the offspring were tucked into their beds she came down with Muttzart, a musical stuffed dog
and scrolled through the selections until she got to one particular piece.

"This makes me 'bemember' Al", she stated to me and started to cry. Really cry, not just a "little girl who wants an excuse to get out of bed whimper". After a few minutes of sobbing on my lap, Mr. Clean came in to see what was wrong. Through fat tears she told him, so he printed out a picture of Al he had taken earlier for her to take to bed and then like the superhero that he is he scooped her up in his arms and carried her back to bed. When he came back his eyes were red.

Giving him a hard time, I said "Suuuure, she makes you cry, but when I blub like a baby it does not affect you." His reply to me? "You tore me apart too."

And that's how you make a a big, tough, firefighting Mr. Clean tear up.