One of the most important conversations I had last year came in the final stages of my mom's life. She was in the hospital and we had already endured the end-of-life discussions with doctors and specialists around my mom's hospital bed. But, now, my dad and I were back at home, sitting at the dining room table in a room that could only be called a disaster, talking with the head of the hospice organization in the city. He explained, like I'm sure he has to many people, that the end of life is not tidy. It is messy. "Death and dying," he said, "is messy." I looked around the room at medicine bottles everywhere, bills and notes and get-well cards strewn about. Common items like car keys and batteries, random cash and 27 different kinds of pens were scattered across the table and the counter next to it. What the man said clicked in my head. Yes, what we had been through all these months, and especially the past three months, was definitely a mess....
Up all hours talking baseball, cardboard & collecting