My phone rang. It was past 9:00 pm, a little strange for someone to be calling me at this hour on a Monday night. It was my dad.

"Have you heard about your grandmother yet?"

Oh great. I was preparing myself for another she-caught-her-microwave-on-fire story. (She's 87 and lives alone, four houses down from my parents. Her eyesight, memory, hearing, etc. are failing her, so the accident stories I get become increasingly worse.)

"Did she catch her house on fire?" I asked reluctantly.

"No, she's in the hospital." My heart sank. It was just an upper-respiratory infection, but when you're in your late 80s it is a lot harder to fight when your body is already failing. Her white blood cell count was 25,000. In addition, she was severely dehydrated and they were pumping her full of IV fluids. According to my mom, she'd been sleeping constantly for the last few weeks and refused/forgot to eat or drink.

I managed to get to the hospital last night after my husband finished work and the kids were in bed. The room was silent and dimly lit. I slipped in quietly. My grandmother was fitfully asleep, pulling her blankets closer to her chin to keep warmer. Her cheeks were more sunken than I remembered. She looked so frail and thin. I gently kissed her warm forehead. Her eyes flew open and she let out a happy little "Oh!"

For the next thirty minutes, she delighted in looking at pictures my children had colored for her, flowers and a scented candle I had brought, and we looked at videos and photos of the kids on my phone. The nurse came in to check her blood pressure and temperature. My grandmother wanted to show her (and everyone else who came in the room that night) pictures of "her babies." She chattered on excitedly for a while about my three kids and how she was getting another great-grandbaby this Spring.

As the night progressed, she became less coherent and didn't talk as much because it hurt for her to breathe and talk. I continued to talk to her, telling her about our plans for our next home and some of the features that I wanted, one of which was a large covered patio in the back yard for cookouts.

"Oh, I hope I'm around for that," she whispered, "but if not, I'll be watching from Heaven and enjoying it with you."

My throat tightened. "You'll be there," I assured her. As it got closer to 11:00, I pulled my chair closer to her bed and sat quietly, waiting for my mom to arrive. I watched her slow, shallow breathing. It was hard to believe that she was travelling around Israel just seven short years ago.