2017.3 Geraldine

Today marks a year since my sister-in-law's sister Geraldine Black died, completely unexpectedly.  If you don't know how awful that was or how it impacted me, and my family, feel free to read last years blog entries.  In honor of this sad anniversary, my sister-in-law Rebecca Kinkade-Black wrote today's blog entry.  It is perfect.

If I were to make a “Best of Christmas” reel almost all of those memories would include my sister. My sister loved Christmas. I think she loved it because it is a time of generosity and giving, which embodies the type of person she was every single day of her life. Also, my sister loved her some bling.  

I remember some of my earliest memories of my sister showing me how to decorate the tree. She was always patient, but very detail oriented. I wanted to speed through the process to see the final product, but not my sister. She showed me how to evenly distribute the lights and how to drape the tinsel in small quantities so the tree would sparkle. The tinseling process took a lot of time with her method, but she relished in the process and the final product was always magnificent.

My sister especially loved to play Santa at Christmas dinner. Every year all of my maternal grandparents’ children and their children would come together to eat and open gifts on Christmas day. My sister would don the requisite Santa hat and hand out the gifts from under the tree. Sometimes there would be hundreds, but she was jovial all the way to the last one.

After presents were opened, we would play bingo for prizes, and my sister kept everyone laughing with her jokes and razzing. Seriously, every time she entered a room the noise level jumped and she would make someone laugh within the first 30 seconds of her arrival. She also made everyone angry during the Bingo segment because she would go home with half the prizes because she was so lucky at the game.

Back to the topic of Santa, she wasn’t only Santa handing out gifts she was also my Santa. Unknown to me, until I was about 9, my sister was the one who stuffed my stocking with goodies and gifts to be found Christmas morning. I still remember finding out my sister was Santa. One night, when I was about 9, I heard my parents call my sister, after I had gone to bed, to ask if she was going to bring the items to stuff my stocking. I never revealed to her I knew her secret identity and she continued to fill my stockings every year unabated until I was about 23. In fact, when I met Juliet and she moved in with us, my sister filled her stocking too. All my best presents came from her and my most treasured is a stuffed animal I named Sprinkles. I got him when I was five and we have been inseparable since. I hug him now and think of my sister and the greatness of her love for me.

 As we close in on the one year mark of my sister’s passing I think of what a gift it was to have her as my big sister and I feel gratitude for having her in my life for 34 years more than most people got with her. Though she is physically gone from this earth her spirit of generosity, selflessness, kindness, humor and all around wonderfulness reverberates through all the people she touched from acquaintances, to friends and family. The sentiment I heard most in those first awful days last year was she never met a stranger and she treated everyone like her best friend. She was my best friend, my protector, my constant. The void left by her passing is huge, but that void is continually being filled little by little when people share the ways she touched their lives. As long as memories of her live so will my sister.