My youngest sister, Lottie Charbonnet Balugo Fields (on the right facing us), passed away this day -- July 17, 2010 at around noon -- on the 66th anniversary of the explosion at Port Chicago. We were attending the annual Day of Remembrance when word of her death came only moments after arriving at home.
My eldest sister, Marjorie Charbonnet Brooms (seen here on my left), left us many years ago in mid-life on the day that President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, or during those few chaotic days before his burial. I remember traveling by train to attend her funeral and the radio broadcast of the moving of the cortege down Pennsylvania Avenue being aired on the train as the miles slid by ... all those silent stunned faces. I'm not sure that I ever properly grieved over Marjorie's loss -- somewhere it all blended into some horrific nightmare. So many thoughts, both beautiful and troubling -- as it is always with those of us left behind ... how awful it is when time runs out on things unsaid ... .
I remember that when Uncle Louis, my father's younger brother died -- how my dad was distressed that "God has sent his messenger's to take away Louie out of sequence. I should have died first!"
Is that what I'm feeling; survivor's guilt?
Photo from the E.F. Joseph collection