My Grandmother, Arilee Pollard, wife of Lakers HoFer Jim Pollard (played with Mikan, Mikkelsen and Martin), passed away this morning. She went peacefully in her sleep.
Is that really your grandmother? That's incredible! I'm sorry for your loss. Losing family members is always tough.
Obviously that pic is not a family pic. Technically she's my wife's aunt, but we all called her Grandma. I never got to meet Jim, he passed before Sarah and I started dating. But she remembers him fondly and tells stories about him. I met Arilee at Christmas '94. I was home from deployment and staying with Sarah's family. We're still not dating at this point, just good friends (went to HS together). It turned out that our extended families lived pretty close to each other, so I went with her to visit hers, then she joined me in visiting mine. Arilee took one look at us and said, "So how long have you two been together?" We both started stammering denials and generally looking ridiculous. Arilee didn't really believe us and just looked at us funny. Three days later we realized that we were actually dating, all protests notwithstanding, and have been together ever since. It took a kind, wise, no-nonsense woman to get us to realize it. Arilee had been...declining? Yes. She'd been declining for several months. No illness, just succumbing to age. Lots of time with family to say goodbyes. General sadness all around, but no regrets. She led a wonderful life.
I'm glad you have such a tremendous story to tell. That's almost exactly the same thing that happened with my own grandmother.
