an end to continue

I came to the hospital late last night to visit my grandmother who had been admitted earlier in the morning. There's a whole basket of things wrong with her, starting with diabetes and kidney failure, not to mention old age and numerous other ailments.

As I look at her in her bed, helpless and often in pain, I can't help but wonder what we're meant for. We ask young children, "Do you know me? Do you know my name?" I find my aunts and the nurses asking my grandmother the same questions. "Do you remember me? Do you know my name?" We revert back into little children as we grow older. We're treated like little children as we grow older, feebler, weaker... more vulnerable.

It's a sad state to see a human being in the last stages of their life. She brought six children into the world, all daughters into a society and era that placed higher value on males than females. She brought them all up working a rice cake store, scrounging, saving, surviving. There are countless stories that I'll never get to hear from her, countless questions that she'll never answer.

Does she know her end is near? Does she feel pain? What is she thinking? As she opens her eyes and looks at me, there's a split second that she recognizes me: the eldest daughter of her eldest daughter. After that fleeting moment, she's closed her eyes again, groaning softly.

Her story continues with me, but I'm not sure how to tell it.