By Tuulia Koponen
Business/Public Relations Manager
@tuulipia

Her strong facade was quickly crumbling. Her eyes began to blur with tears behind her black-rimmed glasses; her tight smile starting to slightly tremble. Her eyes were already red from crying, and it was evident they would only get more red.

This was the sight of my grandmother via Skype a little over three years ago as she and my father spoke with my mother, my brothers and me about how my grandfather was doing at the hospital. He had fallen into a coma for the second time around a month ago.

It was evident by how hard my grandmother was trying not to cry that he was not getting any better. My father relayed that life support had been keeping him going and that playing his favorite songs would revive him to give a few murmurs before going blank again.

Not long after that Skype call my grandmother and my father made the difficult decision to take him off life support and put him to rest for good. It was a relief that his suffering had ended, yet it stung – bad – for all of my family and me.

The sting from his passing was only intensified for my grandmother due to her younger sister passing just a few years prior. It took her a long time to regain her strength and her happiness after her death, but she did. But, this time it was her husband, the person she had pledged to love and take care of from the beginning of their marriage until death and now death had come and taken him away from her unexpectedly. She just felt lost.

So lost that she would relay how she felt she had no meaning left in her life. She would always say how she was just waiting for death to take her away because she felt that was all she had left.

Even now, three years later, she still feels just as lost. But, the admirable thing about my grandmother is that even though she may feel like she has nothing left to give to the world, she will make everyone else feel as if they really do have something to give to the world.

Her face lights up the moment she sees my brothers or me on a Skype call. Her smile travels from her lips expanding and her teeth showing up her cheeks to her eyes as they crinkle lightly at how much joy she feels. Even with our rough appearances so early in the morning, she exclaims that we are all growing up to be beautiful people and marvels at all of our successes.

If she comes across people unexpectedly in the street, she will say a greeting and chat a little bit, throwing her head back from laughing lightly. At the grocery store, she will joke about how she cannot find her card or her euros, causing the cashier to smile. Even if she just keeps a solemn look on her face, she always relays a thank you when someone does something for her.

When she is around her brothers and their wives, she is really there. She listens intently, laughs and smiles at appropriate times, and has just an air of gratitude around her as her face takes the shape of someone who is just so grateful to be there and to be around people that love her and adore her just as much as she does them.

The two summers I have visited her since his death have been hard. It’s different, it’s weird without him being around. It is evident based on how my grandmother’s face falls at times that she is not over him being gone – and will always have some sense of lingering pain with her.

But, still, she smiles. She laughs. Her eyes sparkle as they fill up with tears – happy tears – as she exclaims at how she cannot believe that my mom, my dad, my brothers and I are there with her making her feel whole once again.

She does not think that she has a beautiful exterior, she constantly points out the wrinkles upon her face, the fat around her stomach or how her whole body is aging and dying simultaneously. She pokes fun at the sleeve she wears upon her arm so it is easier to use. She will brush off compliments as if they mean nothing to her, but I know they do.

To me she is beautiful because she has strength. She does not want anyone to see her crumble and does her very best to hide her tears. But when she cries, it is genuine. There is something strangely beautiful about that.

She is beautiful because even though she is struggling to find a new normal and accept herself and this new way of life, she will make everyone feel as if they are a somebody. She will make everybody feel as if they are important and she cares. She will tell people when she finds them beautiful and when she tells someone he or she is beautiful she means it – 100 percent.

She has a way of seeing the best in people and ensuring in whatever simple way she can that everything will be alright, that life will treat them fine, that they have nothing to worry about as she continues to overcome the adversity of the past few years.

To me, that is the most beautiful thing a person can be. Strong, compassionate and finding a way to see the best in people even when life has thrown her the worst set of cards, finding a way to make people feel as if they really are worth something and loved and cherished even if she does not feel that way and really being there when she is around those she loves.

It is the most beautiful thing, isn’t it? Because that’s what she is and always has been – absolutely beautiful.