Just when I think that this grieving thing is over, it sneaks upon me once more, much like a stone inside your shoe, it cannot be ignored.

Six years ago today, I was sitting at my father's bedside keeping vigil as I had done for the five weeks he had been paralyzed. I sensed that the end was near. Nothing much changed on this night. Just a knowing without knowing. His breathing seemed more rapid than before, although it was by no means labored. I spent the entire night watching over him. Afraid that he would slip away if I fell asleep. I rested my head on the side of his chest and waited for dawn to break.

Around 10:40 I realized that I had not fed his beloved animals. I went into the yard, casting some cracked wheat to his many pigeons. Gave his six chickens some fresh water and corn. I wasn't gone for more than five minutes. Within those five minutes, my father died. Although he had been comatose for a few days, he opened his eyes for my mother, smiled , and raised his head to kiss her. Then, he just stopped breathing.

It was very hard for me to accept this timing. I so much wanted to be by his side as he drew his last breath.....I did however, witness the exhale of his last breath as I held him close to me.

Anniversaries. They sneak up on you and stir the old wounds. They draw blood from where you were sure there was no longer a scab, only a scar. I was so glad it was raining when I realized that my scab was torn today. No one realized that I was crying.

Rain, just rain.

A girl after my own heart!

After a six year interruption, the old equipment in the cellar came alive again.

My hands are tinged purple from dancing with the juice of my father's grapes. After a six year moratorium, we had a "vindima" this year. The last one was very painful since my father fell ill on the day we finished. He waited until the last grandchild left to collapse with what would be his final cerebral hemorrhage. I recall trying to save the wine that had been crushed into the barrels. It was an impossible task for one person to accomplish alone. I recall crying in despair as the reality of the situation became more than I could take. My father laid upstairs paralyzed and the fruits of his last labor slipped away gushing out of my control onto the floor.....

Perhaps this milestone marks the end of the deep grieving.

During the vindima, we spread some of my father's ashes onto the yard. This had been a request of his. My mother had strong objections but went along with it. It was the most serene, I would almost call it "sacred" experience. Our guests and the family went into the garden late at night through a pathway lit with candles inside chinese lanterns. Each one of us carried a candle. My father rests under an apple tree in this piece of land that he loved so.

Since that date, my mother has been rather agitated. The ground is not hallowed. She holds her beliefs tightly to the strings of the Catholic Church. An institution that has been so cruel to her, but she continues to hold it in a place that I cannot an will never understand.

Yesterday, a priest came over with a family friend. This property is somewhat famous around these parts and people like to visit. It is a little Eden in the middle of the city. Most unusual indeed.

My mother requested that the priest bless the land. In her eyes/heart this would make it right.
I was overjoyed when his comments were exactly the same as mine. As he told my mother, that land was more than blessed by my father's toil and sweat. His love of it had blessed it long ago.
Nevertheless, he blessed it to make an old woman's heart beat more peacefully.