My oldest aunt — my father’s sister– passed away last week. She’d been in and out of the hospital with chest pains, and her health was poor. She was also apparently botching her medications. There is some speculation among family members that she knew what she was doing with the medications, and may have been mis-using them on purpose.

Depression in the family is so rampant. I wonder who else is suffering? My Aunt Aileen could have probably lived a much longer life, but she was fairly poor, living on Social Security. She has little education.

In spite of her poor health, she loved her family above all else. A couple days before she died, I received an anniversary card from her, because she always remembered birthdays and anniversaries. She took care to make her own cards.

She had a great interest in genealogy. She sent me a packet in the mail a couple years ago, with family history information, and a request to give her information about our family that I might have, such as my kids birthdays, and so forth. I decided to do one better, and I found geni.com, a website where you can make elaborate family trees, and your family members can collaborate together online.

Aunt Aileen LOVED geni.com, and she worked very hard entering our family information there. Geni.com also gave her the ability to send email greetings for anniversaries and birthdays. This weekend, I received an email from my dead aunt.

Even in death, she remembered us. Spooky.

So tomorrow I am going to her funeral. Annie decided she wants to come along, while Carla isn’t going to. Carla is taking horseback riding lessons as a part of day camp, and I don’t want her to miss it. The funeral is in New York, so some travel is necessary. It’s odd that Annie wants to go, as she didn’t know Aileen at all.

I’ll be glad to have my little sunshine with me. She makes me happy in spite of with her constant cheerful chatter.