How do you say good-bye?

It doesn't come up often in my regular life. As a matter of fact, aside from the knowledge that my mother, who lives with us, has a debilitating, terminal illness, I don't have to think about dying people very often. At least, not up close. I get plenty of the same kind of public exposure that every wired-up, plugged-in person is subjected to, but there's a fundamental difference between reading about people dying in a storm or a bombing, and visiting the hospice room of someone I've hugged, laughed with, had earnest talks with, commiserated with.

She is not my best friend. More like a warm acquaintance of many years. The ovarian cancer that is killing her has been part of her for all the time I've known her. She and Jill have shared the bond of being cancer survivors, being well and whole, then unexpectedly without assurance, then well again, however tenuously. It has come up to bite her over and over, a pattern of advance and retreat, until now the journey is over.

How do you say good-bye to a world that will go on without you? How do you look at a Carolina spring, achingly blue sky, embarrassing riches of blooming trees, swirling blossoms, every shade of green bursting from trees, bushes, grass? How do you say good-bye to the people who have tickled you into fits of giggles at work, stormed out of the room in a burst of anger, cried out for you in pain, offered to hold your hand and give you comfort in despair?

There is no reason, no justification for this. The day has come for her to say good-bye to everything she has known, a natural part of life, they say. Everything has a beginning and an end. Never mind that she is younger than I, has yet to see her own child settled in life, has unfinished business with people she has loved. It makes no difference for any of us, does it? The day will come for you, for me, for all of us.

I actually think about this a lot. Sometimes it distresses me. Often it surprises me. So many people I have known and loved have already gone, but where? I look at a photo and they were alive when it was taken and now they're not. I look at pictures of my children when they were young and even those children are gone, only a memory, just as surely as if they had died. There is no more Andrew in a Superman suit, no more Ashley in a purple, spangled tutu, dancing around the kitchen table. The adults they grew to become are here, thank goodness, and I can talk to them and hug them, but the children have disappeared.

My mother is fading before my eyes. An unimaginative characterization of her dementia is of a photograph gradually fading away. But actually the parts I knew best have been gone a long time. She was the 32 year old who wore glamorous clothes and smelled lovely as she breezed past me, her spike heels clicking on the floor. She was the conspiratorial comrade, partner-in-crime with a drink in one hand and cigarette in the other, impulsively jumping in the car for a midnight ride to excitement. She was the fifty-year-old who still looked 35, torn jeans and scoop-neck knit shirt, herding kindergartners, directing plays, meeting me for drinks and bingo at the officer's club. But that woman no longer exists. She doesn't even remember any of that.

Jill and I get to deliver the flower arrangement. The advantage of being retired is that I get to run the errands, order the flowers, pick them up. Everyone at her work has contributed, but somehow I got to make the decision. The "Butterfly Basket" seemed right to me, the metaphor being apt and the picture appealing. When I picked them up, I buried my face in the blooms, breathing in the sweetness, imagining how I might feel to smell flowers at the end of my life. My practical self, the unromantic part, was critical of buying cut flowers ---- they're so expensive and they're just going to die. But when I put my face into the pinks and purples, breathed in the extravagant perfume, I knew that this is what I would want, of course. What could be better?

Sue, there is no way to say good-bye, but there is no way not to. You have been loved by people you don't even know. Your life has been worthwhile. You are, and will remain, a beautiful person. Bon Voyage.