Congratulations!...I'm so sorry...

I didn't really want a wedding shower at all, but when all is said and done I will have had three.
This past weekend was the 'big' shower that my mom, all her friends and all the women in my family were throwing me. NB: My family consists of mostly women, all loud, fast talking strong willed women who I love very much. My mother also works with women of the same type. I had 17 hosteses in all, all of them with a specific job, all of them ruling the roost.
Simultaneous with the last of the planning for this shower, my 94 year old grandmother was put in the hospital to try and build her strength. She had been losing alot of weight in the nursing home and becoming more and more distant to us. Two days after being put in the hospital the doctor informed us that she had about 4 days to live. For 8 days my dad and his sisters sat at her bedsite and watched her deteriorate and we, her grand, great grand and great great grand children came in and out to pay our last respects. It was an emotional week I have to say. I'm the caboose when it comes to grandchildren so I got spoiled alot and as a result grew pretty close to her. She was fiesty and full of life for about 93 of her 94 years...even with alzheimers in the nursing home but she had been suffering for a while and we all knew she would be happier when the suffering was over. So as usual, with the pain was joy...in more than one way.
She passed away on Thursday evening at about 7 oclock, my second loss of a grandparent in 4 months. The funeral was planned for Saturday at 10 a.m the same time exactly as my shower. I thought for sure that my shower would be cancelled or moved or postponed since it was to be held at my dad's sister's house and this was her mother we were talking about here. They would hear nothing of the sort. They told me 'Mom' (my grandmother) would want me to be at the shower and they wouldn't hear of me skipping it or it being cancelled. I'm sure they thought they were taking a great weight off of my back, but I only felt a greater one there and I cried. I wanted to be at the funeral Mass, to say goodbye in the grace of the sacraments, as she would have wanted it. So Friday I spent the day at the funeral home paying my last respects and on Saturday I rebelled and went to the Mass anyway.
For almost an hour of my two hour shower all the women in the world (including my grandmother who had now managed to be where she would not have been before) laughed and talked and drank bellini punch without the bride-to-be in their company, some may not have even noticed that I wasn't there. When I did arrive we had a wonderful time, bitter sweet as it was. I felt loved and overjoyed and sorrowful and it was the most memorable shower that I think I'll ever have.