My grandfather, soul shining like heaven while he was waiting to catch the light streaming through the tiny window above his hospital bed: clinical, clean, white sheets, soft pillows, one plastic chair for family members to enter and exit in the dark dream from life to death. He watched this game of chance: his family members exchanging worried glances, scraping chair legs across the linoleum and glossy floors, staring at the silver chrome steel frame adjustable bed with a tiny sliver of New Mexico clouds floating across the window sill.
He woke up in this life for that last time while it was my turn to say goodbye. He rose up in his bed and told me something he wanted me to understand, ” I can see the next dimension “, his eyes gazing up into the blank t.v screen, this ending is just a beginning. I am going to Ada, Grandpa, Florence; I can see their faces now getting closer, smiling with open arms, waiting for me.” I will never forget this memory of his face, peaceful, unafraid.”One thing I want you to know before I go, this story is just a beginning. I will miss these days we have had, the dinners, the conversation. I love you all so very much. I am so sad to leave you. I will be waiting for you there. It’s just the next dimension of my life.”
When I looked into his silk-lined casket, I knew he was gone, the skin, the eyes, the rumpled suit, the make was all wrong, but his soul was flying free of the slavery of the human race to space beyond time, his soul eternal and divine was joyful dancing above the night sky. Departed into infinite spaces. Forever was real to me then. I understood what he meant by all of it. He knew this ending was just a beginning.
