Final Days

Yesterday, as I checked the 10 day forecast, I received a hard kick to the middle.  Ten days takes us to September 7th.  My mind traveled back two years, trying desperately to remember the details of the last ten days.  Panic grips me as I realize that I can't remember.  I know nearly every detail of her last three days.  But ten??  I don't know how her final ten days with us were spent.

 I can remember a few things that I know happened.  One afternoon she had what appeared to be a stomach virus.  Grant and I had taken her to Walmart and I had just begun to put things in our cart when she grew pale and started coughing a little as though she would retch.  We immediately left the store, groceries could wait.  As I carried her to the car I heard the rumbling of her intestines and though she did not retch, what came out the other end was not pleasant. Later that evening we chuckled as she stood, legs apart, with a bewildered look on her face as her intestines worked again. I know that I called one of my young employees and she agreed to cover the coffee shop while I stayed home and enjoyed some rare moments of Laynee sitting still and snuggling on my lap.  I also know that on Monday, 7 days before she left us, she dazzled everyone at a cross country meet.  Her final three days are memorable because they were out of the ordinary, a weekend get away.  I will forever be grateful for how clearly those days are etched into the pages of my memory. 

I wish that I could say that on this day two years ago we did this or that.  But I can't.  We were busy living, never imagining for a fraction of a second that we did not have many more days with her.  We lived and I know that we loved but those are only generalities.  I can't recall if we danced in the kitchen, how many times we walked over to see the hee hee's,  or if she stuck her tongue on the mirror in her froggy book.  It seems absurd, hideous, inexcusable that I cannot recall the last ten days of her short little life.