I sat rather tenderly in a seat beside my grandmother’s bed at the hospice care facility. Words always escape you when it feels most critical to speak up. My grandfather had barely left her side since she arrived at the center, and continued to stare at her despite us entering the room. Despite me sitting next to him now. Sadness and concern draped the room.

“Look at her,” he said, as I asked how they were doing. I felt horrible seeing her in such a state, and failed again to say the right comforting thing as she declined every minute into a more delicate condition. But I didn’t have to.

“Doesn’t she look beautiful.” He said it with the most extraordinary, radiant love for this woman, his wife of 68 years. Even in the recent years of struggle as her health worsened and her memory faded, even in the pain of his upcoming loss, in that moment he saw through all of those outer symptoms of an aged life. He beheld only the beautiful wife he cherished.

She passed away not long after that, and today, after three years apart, he joined her once again. This time truly forever.

Rest in piece, Grandpa and Grandma. You will be missed.