Memories

Today is a very sad day for me. My daughter passed away a year ago. I just spoke to my wonderful grand-daughter, Victoria, that will be 18 in a few days. She is also graduating from high school in, as she told me, 23 days. She has earned a Certificate for Sous Chef, Fry Cook and getting one for Pastry Chef from the vo-tech there too as well as that coveted high school diploma. She got a scholarship to go to Culinary School but she really does not want to attend college at this time. It has been very hard on her this past year without her Mom. They were more like "best friends" than Mother Daughter. Whatever she wants to do is what she should be allowed to do. The option is always open to come stay with Grandma. I know its cold in Pennsylvania after the heat of Florida. I owned several restaurants and love to cook. So I guess she is more like Grandma than I thought. She really likes the Pastry Chef part. Creativity is in her blood.

My Steph was a spitting image of me. I always told her to take a good look at me and she could see herself at my age. She was bi-polar. It was a heartache to see what she went thru from day to day. The mood swings, the nighmares, the depression, the highs, the lows. The drama was way too much sometimes. She was afraid of so many things and loved so many things. She imagined things that were not there and people were threatening her when no one was there. She heard people talking about her and she would cry. Then there was the happy Steph that loved the beach, spending the day with her daughter doing girly things. She loved to get her nails done and her hair. She collected glass and swans of all kinds. She loved beautiful clothes and the sunshine. She loved coming to the restaurant to get some of "Moms great food". She loved to eat out and have people wait on her. She always said she was a princess. She was named after the Princess Stephanie. The meds were another thing. One to keep her lithium level, one for this and one for that and then one to help her sleep. Seraquil was that one and that is what killed her. One of the side effects is death so why in Gods name would any doctor prescribe something that can potentially kill a person. Her death certificate says "accidental overdose" and what they think happened was she had taken her meds and forgot that she had taken them and took them again. She had twice as much in her system as she should have. I can see that happening. Her mind was like swiss cheese to remember anything.

She came to Pennsylvania to see me and loved the camp where we were and she loved having Mom cook for her everyday. I loved having her here. I made her a new doll with her purple dress for her bed while she was here.

She is gone now but she will live forever in my heart and in my memories. She is with her Dad and her Grandma that she loved so much.