If I look back in my journal and search for the word “grandma,” there’s only one person who appears. She’s neither of my biological grandmothers, who had both passed on by the time I was ten, but my husband’s grandmother—Janice.

She first showed up in my life when I was seventeen. I was stricken with fear to meet Tommy’s “Houston grandparents,” this rags-to-riches, powerhouse couple who’d traveled the world, mastered the stock market, and given my then-boyfriend some of his best childhood memories. Before that first dinner at Texas Roadhouse, I’m pretty sure I googled, What’s a Dow Jones? in hopes of having something intelligent to say. But I shouldn’t have worried. Before I could butter my second roll, Grandma and I were chatting away about our favorite authors and books (Karen Kingsbury for her; Francine Rivers for me).

Pretty quickly I learned that there was nothing pretentious about her. She was the ninth of ten kids, lost her dad at age two, and grew up dirt poor and happy in Nebraska. Her childhood, marriage, and family were inextricable from her identity, sturdy roots she returned to with esteem and affection again and again. She was grateful for all of life, the good times and the bad, because it was those hard times—the poverty and loss and long hours working and raising kids—that gave her eyes to understand and appreciate the good.

Once I married Tommy, I was permitted entry into the inner sanctum of “Habegger Happenings,” which included participation in the Christmas gift exchange, Wednesday nights at Tio’s Mexican Restaurant, and vacations to places like Disney World, Rome, and Hawaii.

But it was only once Tommy and I moved to Texas that it felt like I was getting the real grandparent experience. I loved those early mornings at the breakfast table with Grandma and Grandpa, drinking Folger’s coffee, eating stale cereal, and glancing over the newspaper, sometimes talking and sometimes not.

Or swimming in the pool while Grandma did her laps and sang hymns to herself. Laying on the couch reading while Grandma read in her recliner. Or Grandpa teaching me how to wash dishes properly, like a real Nebraskan farmwife.

I began to think, So this is what it means to have grandparents. There’s no expectation to be entertained. You’re just part of it, nothing special, not a guest to be tip-toed around, but an ordinary kid who is reminded not to waste the orange juice. That’s what I loved most—getting to be an ordinary part of Tommy’s family, even if there were no blood ties to bind.

Grandma Janice received a cancer diagnosis in November 2019, a month after turning 80. Following the first surgery, the situation looked dire, and we tried to prepare for the worst. But Grandma started treatments during the initial COVID lockdown, took a break for several months, then bravely started chemo again when the cancer recurred.

It was a miracle that she was able to meet our son, Jack Robert, born in January 2021. She cradled him as she had cradled three children and seven grandchildren before him. We visited Houston often over the course of Jack’s first year, knowing that we were in the final pages of Grandma’s story. It was almost as if Jack sensed life’s urgency and was determined to make the most of it. He hit several milestones while visiting his great-grandparents—rolling over on his playmat and pulling himself to his feet while clinging to their windowsill.

While visiting last Thanksgiving, Tommy and I started “interviewing” Grandma and Grandpa about their life story in order to put a book together for a Christmas present. We learned about their immigrant grandparents arriving from Europe, their long-distance relationship while Grandpa was stationed with the air force in Bermuda, and how they became engaged via letter. We heard about the lean years as Grandpa worked and went to school full-time and they raised three kids. “We ate lots of eggs on toast.”

It hit me in a way that had eluded me before—this was my son’s family. This was Jack’s heritage, the building blocks of his story. Jack is part of me, and they are part of Jack. It’s one of those wild truths about family—how the next generation acts as a bridge inextricably knotting us together.

Just six weeks ago, Grandma called us to say she had stopped chemo. When I started crying, she said, “It’s going to be all right, sweetheart,” as if I were the one needing reassurance. If you search for my journal pages about Grandma, the same words appear over and over—strong in spirit, uncomplaining, at peace.

“I’ve had such a wonderful life. I know where I’m going,” she has said to me many times.

But the hard truth remains that there’s never enough time. We’re never ready to let go. Time is the medicine we can’t buy or manufacture. It’s a painful reminder of our finiteness. As created beings, we accept Time like a gift, because there’s nothing more we can do.

Yes, I believe I’ll see Grandma again, not in Texas, not with a cancer-broken body, but in a future place where we’re whole and joy-filled. But the waiting in between, that’s the part that hurts.

If life is an ocean, then loving and being loved is the water within it. Yet as beautiful as family is, it’s merely a shadow of that ultimate family tree being grafted together from all tribes, nations, and tongues across the earth. Someday, all tears will be dried for good and all of those who have hoped in Christ will sing together for joy.

But while we wait, bearing the sorrow of our parting, the next generation grows and learns the stories, hopefully embracing the good and learning from the bad. Making their own mistakes and celebrating their own triumphs. Tying us together as people who belong to each other. Family.

After Grandma’s funeral and burial, her family gathered at her house. About seven o’clock, Tommy put Jack in pajamas and carried him back into the living room so everyone could say good night.

Jack waved a hand in the air and in one of those rare, serendipitous moments that makes life so sweet in its unexpectedness, he hit another milestone. “Night-night,” he said, the first words he’s ever uttered. “Night-night.”

“If I don’t see you again, know that I love you forever.”

We know, Grandma. We love you, too. Good night for now.