He was on his way to the hospital this day .......he knew.

This is Gabriel's story he wrote a year ago (he was 4) for the shiva at our house (to remember grandpa and to help him process the loss)

"This is my grandpa.  I love him very much.  Grandpa loves me very much. 

I liked to do many things with grandpa. I liked to: Go to the park. Go to the pond to see turtle hodtels.  Play ping pong.  Me and grandpa liked to play baseball.  We like to go to the golf course and play golf - real golf.  Our favorite thing to do is to go to the muffin place! Me and grandpa like to play records on the record machine.

Grandpa got cancer.  We went up to portland to do chemo and radiation. We rode the train.  We went on the streetcar.  And then we rided on the big electric train to go to the zoo.  Then after a long time grandpa had surgery. Then he had a hard time breathing. He had another surgery, but this time the doctors couldn't make him better. He was too sick.

We sang "Take me out to the ballgame" and he smiled.

I went to sleep in the waiting room.  Mama and Baba told me grandpa had died when I woke up. 

This is what happened when he died:  Everyone (mama, baba, nana, uncle matt and uncle mike) was with grandpa when he died.  They all sang "Take me out to the ballgame" again for grandpa. Grandpa smiled thinking about all the love he has for us. Then his heart stopped beating and he stopped breathing.  His spirit went out of his body and into the energy and mystery of the world.  Mama sang the Shema.   We don't know what the mystery is like, but we know granpa is all around us.

It's okay to feel lots of feelings.  I feel sad when I miss grandpa.  I feel scared and sad and mad when I can't make grandpa come back.  I feel sad when I see other people cry.  Sometimes I feel two feelings at the same time.  I felt happy playing baseball with mama and baba but still sad about grandpa.

Grandpa is always with me.  He is with me when I: Play baseball and golf, play in the backyard, rest on the hammock, figure out how things work, am kind to others, when I walk by the river, when I fart, when I eat blueberry muffins, when I dance, when I say the shema. My grandpa always loves me.