Even though I keep a daily journal, my notes on the pandemic are sparse. I recall best those very early days when neither science nor faith could stem the tide and terror, fear, and dread of the virus. As an older person, I felt my age for the first time, as both a high-risk target for the disease and as a vulnerable elder requiring careful watch and extra protection. I’ve learned that children can be just as paternalistic as their parents in that caring but condescending way. 

I do have an entry in my daily notes for Sunday April 5^th, a few weeks after the federal government declared a national emergency, just a week after the U.S. had more COVID cases than anywhere else in the world. We were in the early days of lockdowns, travel bans, shortages. Fear of the disease and of each other. Daily briefings. Panic. On that day, I spoke with my sister in Florida.  A few weeks prior, we had set up bi-weekly check ins. That Sunday, we talked about how these could be our final days. That sentence sounds melodramatic when I write it, but it rings true to my experience. On that day, we broached the subject of final plans. She had organized a box full of important documents with my name on it on the second shelf of her guest room closet. All her contacts– professional ones and personal ones – to be notified when she passed away. Emails, phone numbers, passwords, online accounts. She had thought of everything – so kind. I committed to doing the same thing as soon as possible, yet still to this day, four years later, I have left most of this undone.

She considered almost everything. I asked her about her eulogy. Had she thought about who would say those final words? As soon as the question left my lips, I knew what I wanted to hear. As her older sister, I prayer it would me. She confirmed that hope. I would deliver her eulogy and she mine. We wondered together whether we knew everything we should know about each other. I made these notes in my journal. Committed to writing Marcia’s eulogy. That sent me down a rabbit hole of wondering. Was I really the best person to write this? Did I really remember the important points in her life?  Did I underestimate how painful those early illnesses were for her? Did I comprehend how deeply she at age twelve felt my father’s early death? Did I know the whole story about her marriage? Did I appreciate how deeply others loved her? Did I know only my special sister-side of her? Did she know I’d nearly been hospitalized for depression? That I came close to suicide more than once? Those eulogies may reveal more than we have told each other so far. These can be reckonings. 

I delivered my first eulogy for my mother. I asked her parish priest if I could say a few words after Mass. He told me that this wasn’t the custom in his parish but since my mother was a parishioner, he’d allow it. I could have three minutes. Three minutes? For my mother? And then I thought of her, so hating attention in any of its forms. She would tell me to take no more than two minutes, more than enough to say what needed to be said. So, I delivered that eulogy from my heart as I knew my Mom to be, underestimated, full of broken strength. I learned during the reception in the church basement how much I didn’t know about her. How kind she was to a neighbor. How much attention she paid to a lonely resident in assisted living. How crazy funny she was. That she was a wonderful dancer in her twenties. How she was a complete person separate from me—a richer, deeper, more complex story than I knew. I wished I had done better for her. Reaching beyond what I know or think I know; I will do better for my sister.