"Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my end be like his!"
Num. 23:10, RSV

 "Doctor, this is Ruth Moore's daughter." I stood talking at a phone in the corridor outside her hospital room. "Well, I just wanted to know . . . she can't eat anything, can she? And another operation is impossible, isn't it?" It should have been--she had undergone three operations in the past four years, since they first discovered her colon cancer. "Well, then, how long can she go on like this? How long . . . ?" His answer was evasive and noncommittal. I hung up in tears and went back to her room.

 She was close to dying. I knew it, and it angered me that the doctor would not just come out and say it. So I stayed at her bedside almost every moment of that last week. I wanted to be with her when she died.

 I sat and watched as she roused herself from a semi-conscious state to speak a little to visitors--relatives, mostly, whom I knew and loved. They came and spoke briefly, cheerfully, to her, then left with bowed heads after seeing her wasted condition. She was only 53.

 A few came from Mother's church, where she had taught Sunday school until she was too weak to continue. When her pastor came, I thought she was sleeping, and did not want to wake her. He gently insisted, however, and Mother quickly came to when I told her who was there. I stood by while he talked with her just a moment before asking if he could pray. She nodded, and he prayed something like: "Our Father, we come before you today on behalf of your servant Ruth. We ask your healing grace and strength for her, and we commit her care to your hands. Lord, we pray for your comforting presence for her and her family, and for your love to be showered on them in this trial. We praise you for your victory over sin and sickness and death. For it is in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen." Mother nodded assent throughout. He grasped her hand for a moment, then quietly left.

 As each day of that week passed, I had plenty of time to watch her and reflect. I did not think about God or heaven or even praying. Although I was supposedly a Christian, the tenets of my faith did not affect anything I did or how I did it. My husband Steve and I seldom went to church. So I did not blame God for what was happening to Mother. I figured He didn't really care.

 Mother loved Him, though. From what I could see, she had only grown closer to Him these past four years. She studied the Bible with the zeal of a new convert, and read aloud from the Psalms at the dinner table. And it had been the joy of her life to spend Christmas the year before in Jerusalem.

 As she worsened, she drifted in and out of consciousness, and seemed to hallucinate. At one point, she awoke with a start and said, "Where's the baby?"

 "Momma . . . what baby?" I asked.

 "I was playing with a baby," she said, looking around. I swallowed. That was Mother, all right, who had five kids and always said she wished she'd had two more . . . who used to tease me and Steve, "All my friends have grandchildren, but I don't have any grandchildren. . . ."

 "Momma, there's no baby," I said. She just lay back down on the pillow.

 Later, when her daughters-in-law were with us, she awoke and asked without preface, "Am I getting better?" She looked straight at me, and I tried to answer, but I could not tell her something I knew was untrue. I broke down and cried in front of her.

 Sunday, around noon, I was sitting by her bed doing needlework. Steve had gone down to the cafeteria to get some lunch for us. Suddenly, Mother gasped once, then again and again--and stopped breathing.

 I thought my heart had stopped, too. I could not look up from the needlework. I could not bear to see it. But almost against my will, I felt compelled to look in her face. As I raised my head, the realization burst on me from outside myself that something stupendous had just happened. Not just the release of a suffering soul, but a victory, a triumph, a brilliant overcoming. I neither saw nor heard anything unusual, but the impression was so strong that it rooted me breathless to my chair. It seemed that her faith in God's goodness had been vindicated full measure.

 When Steve came into the room and saw my face, he rushed to Mother's side. The doctor was summoned. I vaguely remember questions: Which funeral home to call? Did we want an autopsy? The goings-on that followed were a blur. I could only think of her death. What had I witnessed? Nothing, I decided. I only saw her die. Of course, I would have strong feelings watching her die. On further reflection, I knew that was not it. Just watching her die would not have left me feeling like I had seen a miracle unless . . . Someone cared enough to give me a hint about what was really happening.

 After the funeral, we all went home and picked up our lives. But I could not shake the impression her death had left on me. Without any clear idea of what I was looking for, I picked up a Bible and opened it randomly. My eye fell on this passage: "When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written: 'Death is swallowed up in victory.' 'O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?'" (1 Cor. 15:54-55, RSV)

 I closed the book in wonder. Did that really say what I thought it said? I didn't know what to think. I must have been looking for some validation or explanation when I opened the Bible again. This time I read: "No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him." (1 Cor. 2:9, RSV) That was it. Deep within me I knew that she had experienced this victory--that whatever else she was experiencing now was too wonderful for me to even imagine.

 It has been almost four years since she died. In that time, I have experienced God's healing grace and love firsthand. My husband and I have given our lives to the Lord of life, and have received many affirmations that He cares. One such gift stands out, which came by way of prayer on our behalf by friends who saw an unfulfilled need in our lives. About two and one-half years after one soul dear to me left this world, another one entered. Her name is Stephanie Ruth. And I know Momma just loves her granddaughter.

 Seventeen years have passed since I wrote the above essay. Stephanie is about to start college. Her little brother, a freshman in high school, is taller than either of us. And Steve and I, along with my siblings, are watching my father progress through the terminal stages of Alzheimer's and congestive heart failure.

 I am not able to sit with him constantly, as I did with Mother. But Joyce, his faithful wife of twenty years, has lavished him with care, and hospice steps in whenever she is too exhausted to do more. The few hours that I spend at his bedside, I watch him and reflect. Some times Dad knows me; other times I am not so sure. He is sweet-natured and uncomplaining about the discomforts--he thanked the nurse who drew his blood! And he is genuinely appreciative of all expressions of concern.

 I understand that not all Alzheimer's patients are so tractable; they can be combative or abusive. But for some reason, the Lord has spared my stepmother this grief on top of everything else. Maybe Dad himself, knowing his dependence on her, has somehow retained enough presence of mind to master the frustrations of his condition. Maybe he knows he doesn't have much time left, and wants to make it good. Because he hasn't always been like this.

 In his younger, healthier days of rearing five headstrong children, he could be brusque and impatient. Since he worked long hours, he did not suffer interruptions in his free time gladly. Sometimes, I wasn't sure he ever saw me. We never had a real conversation about anything. Now, however, he is content to lie there and listen. He may not know what all I'm talking about, but neither of us minds much. Isn't that the hand of God, when such an awful disease can change someone for the better?

 Watching him, I think about how torn up he was after Mother died. We don't talk about her much; he just can't. But I dream about her now and then. In my dreams, she's always healthy and well, and I'm never surprised to see her that way. I saw her in a particularly vivid dream when I was angry at my younger sister for helping herself to Mother's collection of china cups (before I could). I saw Mother sitting at a banquet table, talking and laughing. When she saw me, she picked up one of those china cups and flung it against the wall, shattering it. "Mother! Don't!" I cried. Still laughing, she picked up another cup and destroyed it in the same way. By the time she had sent a saucer crashing into the wall, I got the message: they were just things. I had my mother seven years longer than my sister had her, so how could I begrudge her these small tokens of remembrance? My sister, incidentally, has been a great help to our family during Dad's illness. With her medical knowledge, she has been able to keep our cross-country siblings intelligently apprised of his condition and his care.

 So we wait, and watch, and I am at peace, knowing that the Lord has given my 79-year-old father what Moses had desired more than anything: "Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom."  (Ps. 90:12, NIV)

 Last Friday night Joyce left a message with my daughter that Dad had taken a turn for the worse. Saturday morning, I called her to let her know I would be coming that morning--it's only an hour's drive. I took my time before leaving--went to the grocery store, packed in case I had to stay overnight, and stopped for a fruit drink for the highway.

 It was noon when I arrived at the care center. Joyce met me at his door: "Oh, honey, you don't want to see this. He's dying."

 "Shouldn't I be here, then?" I asked. I didn't want her to go through that alone.

 Dad was unconscious, breathing in a gurgle. She said he'd been awake earlier, but when breathing became difficult, they had given him a strong painkiller. His breathing was very labored, and occasionally foam appeared on his lips, which Joyce quickly cleaned away. She kept his lips moistened and clean.

 I sat on the bed and held his hand, which was cold. His fingernails were blue. His eyes were partly open, although he was clearly unable to see us. Joyce reached over and gently closed the lids.

 I held her and we said a prayer for his quick and gentle passing, and strength for her in the coming days. The decision had already been made that there would be no heroic efforts to save his life, no attempts at resuscitation when the time came. Now, we just thanked God for the life we had shared with him.

 Sitting on either side of his bed, we visited about trivial, funny family things while Joyce kept a protective hand over his paced heart. Every time he stopped breathing, we fell silent, watching him. Then suddenly he would start to breathe again. Joyce laughed, "Sleep apnea. He's been doing that for years."

 I watched how hard his body struggled to hang on, to continue drawing breaths. At one point I leaned over and whispered, "We love you, Dad. Tell Mom hello. Tell her I miss her."

 There was a particularly strong upsurge of the foam that sent Joyce scrambling for more tissues to clean his mouth. Then he settled back quietly, and Joyce and I looked at each other. He was gone. She kissed him goodbye on the forehead, and I did, too. It was 1:20.

 Joyce summoned the nurse, who took his blood pressure and found no reading. No pulse. No heartbeat. "I'm sorry," she said.

 When the nurse left, Joyce collapsed for just a minute. "I feel like someone ripped my heart out," she said. "No one ever loved me like that man did." Then it was back to the business at hand: calling hospice, calling the funeral home, gathering up his clothes and personal effects. The nurses gave us condolences with tears in their eyes. The cleaning woman was weeping as she embraced us. I was stunned--he had only been here for a few days. What a witness that even she was grieved at his expected death. 

 At Joyce's home, we placed calls to the rest of the family. When her son and daughter arrived I felt it was time to get home myself. Driving back, I was completely unfazed by the normal freeway hysteria. All I could think of was how blessed and privileged I was to have been there for his passing. Just three days before, my husband, son, daughter and I had all been to the care center to see Dad, and he had recognized all of us. It was the same when Mother died--she had been able to tell all of her children goodbye. I did not receive the same illumination that Mother's death brought, nor did my Bible fall open to miraculously relevant passages. It's as if those special measures are unnecessary--I should know the validity of His promises by now. What I do feel is a sense of wonder at the grace of God at every point in life. I just hope Dad didn't forget to deliver my message in all the excitement. 
 

 Ruth Moore died August 27, 1978; John Moore died July 3, 1999.