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Official Death Notice
1980's:
I could probably find the actual date with some digging, but it's an experience that always touched me deeply.
My Great-Grandma Scott was my father's grandmother.
Having reached 98 years old, she literally began to question whether God had forgotten her. All of her friends were long gone, and she missed her husband who'd died many years earlier as well. At her moderate two-floor flat in Brooklyn all she had left were antique furnishings and my Great-Aunt Julia, who was a quite character on her own. Despite being extremely elderly and nearly entirely blind and deaf, Julia cared for Great-Grandma Scott.
Sadly during the last years of her life not all of Great-Grandma Scott was really always still around, but often she was quite lucid so it was not Alzheimer's or such.
One Saturday in the 1980s or so
my father
and I drove into Brooklyn to visit, and Great-Grandma Scott was lucid and quite a bit happily excited about a dream she'd had the night before.
"Robert, Robert," she told him with relief in her voice.
"God came to me in my dreams last night; He told me He's finally coming to take me!"
While my father loved all his relations quite a lot, he did not share my intense passion for the paranormal and/or supernatural outside of cinema.
He was pleasant but clearly humouring her.
I have to admit I wondered why, if God had a spare moment to visit her in her dream, why would/did He not take her along At That Time?
"He's going to take me this coming Tuesday!" she stressed happily, her face beaming with a smile stronger than I'd ever seen: physically she was the stereotypical Elderly Woman, virtually desicated and shrivelled, but now newly renewed hope put life in her small eyes.
My father still pleasantly humoured her, amused at her prediction.
"Dad," I pointed out, slightly annoyed.
"Dreams are extremely Powerful Things, particuarly one that's so strong; what if 'God'
has
let her know it's finally Her Time, for her to prepare herself or such?"
While Dad didn't dispute me, in front of her then or later in the car on the drive home, he clearly still wasn't buying into her foreshadowed claim.
As our visit came to a close, when I said my goodbyes, I really said Goodbye.
On a semi-amusing note, Great-Aunt Julia later reported that after we had left, Great-Grandma Scott did happen to say,
"It's a shame Robert doesn't visit more often."
"He was just here...!" Julia had retorted, but it later occured to me I'm not sure whether Julia was correct in her interpretation that Great-Grandma Scott had almost immediately forgotten we were just there, or whether Great-Grandma Scott was simply observing how often dad had visited.
I have no way of knowing whether Julia just misinterpreted the comment (which is exremely probable), and Great-Grandma was commenting on our just then visit.
Either way, it did not stop Great-Grandma Scott from passing away peacefully in her sleep... the following Tuesday...
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