Ladies and gentlemen, we are floating in space.

En route to Chicago.

The newest addition to the family, Shay, meets Eleanore.

It's always an unsuspecting moment. You're in the midst of some mundane task, thinking about how your stomach is growling or that you need to pick up milk from the grocery store. Nothing seems significant about your day. And there it is – an unexpected dose of reality. Sitting in my inbox.

Subject line: Aunt Eleanore

Tried calling your cell but it’s going straight to voicemail
since you’re working.

Aunt Eleanore peacefully died at 1 in the morning. Funeral is Monday.

Aunt Eleanore was a force to be reckoned with. Stoic. Brassy. Fiercely Irish. It's who she was ... is ... will always be in my mind.

As I sat in the plane bound for Chicago a couple days later, my thoughts drifted in and out. I started to think about how strange and yet oddly fascinating funerals are. Here you are in this room filled with a bunch people somehow connected to some facet of this person's life. Mothers, husbands, cousins, babies, friends, siblings, neighbors, coworkers ... They all come out to pay homage to this person's life.

Then suddenly, I felt this great sadness consume me. Eleanore was the last one standing in a line of great women in my family to grow up first generation American. She was the last living relative who watched my grandmother grow up. The last one to keep the memories of relatives come and gone, alive in our heritage. With her passing came the end of an entire generation of family history.

I will always be thankful for the stories my Aunt Eleanore shared with me about her life this past summer. Even though she had lost her eyesight long ago, I would watch as her beautiful blue eyes lit up to recall the stories of our family.

Here's to you, Eleanore.

May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields.
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of his hand.