"Everyone was with her when it happened, " Mom said on the ride home from the airport. “She left saying she would be in our hearts forever.”  I for one was overwhelmed. It was all too sudden, as if a tsunami had hit my head. My ultimate goal was to support Mom and help her get through it. It had been about a month since mom left for India and grandma had passed. I thought of my grandma as extraordinary. A genuine, honest woman, yet one of the funniest people I had ever met. I couldn’t understand how she was just gone. Sorrow swallowed me up and I felt a deep pang of regret, wishing I could have had more time with her. What was this feeling? Was it grief? I didn’t know or understand it whatsoever. I had to get through it. It would be difficult, but I would face it in a way I never had before.

My mind drove me into thinking about how she died, but instead I decided to revisit the way she lived, in my mind. Maybe this would help me find the closure I needed to continue, but also give me a piece of her to hold on to forever. I thought back to the time I lived in Iowa and she had come to visit. A thunderstorm was on its way and a tornado could occur. My greatest fear- the wild tornado ready to gobble up anything in its path. I wouldn’t have gotten through it without her. I walked into her room and found her folding laundry. She knew it was the storm that I looked so afraid of. “Be brave, if anything happens, it’s god’s wish,” she had told me calmly, smoothing out the shirt she was folding. I was appalled at how could anyone be so serene when an ominous storm was brewing outside. Despite my panic, her tension free expression soothed and relaxed me. I left that moment in my mind and realized she had changed me as a person. Not just someone who helped me get through thunderstorms, but who taught me that courage would brace me through every difficult time.

A similar instance was a time I had visited my grandma in India. Fortunately, her cancer wasn’t as horrid at the time. I remembered her saying how much she loved cricket as a kid. “I used to play with the kids near my apartment. I was able to be who I was as a kid. But when I got married, things changed, and I had to be someone else,” she revealed, stroking her grayish-brown hair. I had never known how my grandma was as a kid. This proved to me that I had opportunities that no one else had and I should use them wisely. She told me to take every chance given to me and make a change in my life.

I came back to where I was right now. I realized how thankful I was to have the time to spend with a grandmother like her. It was and would always be difficult to accept that I had lost someone meaningful and dear to me. Though I wish I could have had more time with her, it was all I had and I obtained the most from it. I hoped to utilize everything I learned from her. For everything she taught me from playing video games on the computer to life lessons for the future, I was truly grateful to have had a grandmother like her.