Do not cry...

[franceslievens]

My grandmother asked us not to cry for her. It wasn't necessary. She was old and it was her time to go.

It shows what kind of woman she was, and why we all cried when my uncle read a text written by his wife. My aunt showed us her mother the way she was and the way we all want to remember her. As someone who lived in her own house until the very end, who loved the plants in the garden and the fruit trees in her yard. Her door was always open for the neighbour's grandchildren. Like my second cousin put it: "You'd ask where are the children? And someone would reply just go and look at Gran's." We all came at her door. We were all raised by her: children, grand-children, nieces, nephews, cousins.

"Take good care of the children," she said. I want to, but frankly I'm scared to death. And excited. On Thursday I got a little taste of how things still might go wrong. My blood pressure was way up high, and didn't go down quickly enough. This might indicate pre-eclampsia. So they monitored my blood pressure and Little Bit's heartbeat and movements, took a load of blood tests, and told me an hour and a half later I was free to go. The moment I sat down in that chair my blood pressure had gone down and stayed there for the rest of the time. The blood tests came back clear, and Little Bit did her best to show off all her movements. I'm just one of those crazy people who gets high blood pressure when she's stressed. Three weeks. We'll manage that.

Comments

[lijability.livejournal.com]

"Serenity now.... serenity now.... serenity now."

Take care. *hugs*


When my great-grand uncle went back to Belgium in 1910, he and his wife found that they arrived in the commune of Meix-le-Tige (down in Luxembourg, about 25 km or so west-southwest of Arlon) to find one of my Rosman uncles or cousins (I still haven't figured out just who) had died and the family was having a post-funeral wake. My gr-gr-uncle (he was born in Vance and grew up in a suburb on the northeast side of Paris) was surprised by the levity of the wake, no mention of the deceased being made, children playing, a feast of food, and I guess the imbibing of a large amount of beer. He thought it to be somewhat uncivilized. Except that is somewhat the way things go around here in America now.

Life goes on....

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, the famous "koffietafel". We aren't outgoing as a family, so no beer, but there were a lot of people there who hadn't seen each other in ages, so they just talked about random stuff. My mother wanted her grand-kids there. She and my aunts went around with them, showing off the kids to various relatives.

One of the best television series made in Flanders is Terug naar Oosterdonk (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0133317/). Oosterdonk is a village that disappeared with the enlargement of the port of Antwerp. When the father of the protagonist dies all the former inhabitants of the village come back together at his funeral. It is a very Flemish gathering with lots of food, drink, and reminiscing.
And then there is also the storyline about the disappearance of someone 35 years earlier...

[lijability.livejournal.com]

And then there is also the storyline about the disappearance of someone 35 years earlier...

Ah... a mystery, maybe some day I'll get to see it, dubbed in English, of course. Might get it on PBS....

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

Well, it's eleven years old, so I don't know whether they'll show it. If I only knew if the dvd-set ha English subtitles as well... I'd be happy to send you a region 1 box-set!

[lijability.livejournal.com]

Oh! Thank you, but please, you don't have to do that. I don't have a DVD player at the moment anyway. The one in my computer even quit playing DVDs, though it still works with data..... go figure.

But the US switches to digital television in February, 2009. So it may be that we get a new digital LCD HDTV; blue-ray/DVD/CD player/recorder, and a Dish or Direct-TV Satellite with a hard drive digital video recorder for Christmas. Throw in stereo speakers and we'll have a home theatre for the farmhouse, doing our part to jumpstart the economy!

[frenchani.livejournal.com]

I wish I had a grandmother like yours.

Three weeks left is nothing. It can happen any time now. Tell P. to send me an email when Little bit shows up!

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

I've told him already to send you an email. I can send a text message to sista, but since you don't own a mobile phone... ;-)

I've made little bags of candy today. Tomorrow I'll tackle the address list for sending out cards. That's after I've tackled the bureaucratic paperwork to make sure I get paid while on leave.

[sister-luck.livejournal.com]

She reminds me of my step-gran and I think you had the same reaction when I wrote about her. And we do the same thing with the coffee and the cake, it's called Reu-Essen in my stepmother's dialect.

I'm glad that you are okay - blood pressure is a funny thing.

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

I guess the blood pressure is a family related problem: my Mama told me again she had the same problem when pregnant with me. They even put her on a saltless diet because of water retention. Luckily they don't do that anymore, because it doesn't help one bit. My sister had the same problem with both her pregnancies: high blood pressure, being monitored for an hour or so and then being sent home.