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This morning, my grandmother Virginia Fenwick, "Nonnie," aged 79, passed away.

She was in the hospital, taken by the ambulance two nights before, when we discovered she was breathing horribly irregularly. Dad called the ambulance and the two of us followed them up there in the car while Mom stayed to keep house. We found out that she had Pneumonia, quite common in bedridden elderly people such as she. Mom and Iva joining us around 3, we waited until 5 in the morning for her before going home. The doctor had kept changing his guesses as to her time left with every look. Her OA rate was in the 70's, when it should have been in the nineties, and her breathing was two times as fast as what it should have been. He told us she would be fine, and then the next second that she could be gone at any second. My Uncle Paul stayed with her while Aunt Ginger came up from North Carolina and Louie from Florida. They got here just in time to help my Dad make the tough decision. All that was keeping her alive was the machines and the medicines. She wouldn't want this. They decided this morning that they were going to take her off of it all, and so my sister Iva and I were going to go see her for the last time. Just as I was about to get dressed, we got the call. She died on her own just before they were to take her off of it all. She passed into heaven peacefully at 8:47, and now she is there with my Grandpa Charles Fenwick, who died near three years ago. I know they must be happy together. I hope they are.

Anyone that knew Nonnie knew that she had been suffering from Alzhimers, and had also suffered a stroke a year and three days ago. She was fighting for the longest time, but she DID NOT LOSE! She has won, in a sense- now she is where she can always be happy, and she lives on in all of our hearts. I will never forget her.

She retired from the NOAA as the FIRST female Yeoman Purser when my mother was seven months pregnant with me. We lived with her until I was three and a half, when we moved to Newport News, across the water. She still came to see us almost every day, and she would take Iva and I to McDonalds every Saturday for a breakfast. We would spend our summers at her house in Chesapeake, and it was the best place on earth to me. I would cry when I had to leave her, and anyone that knows me knows that I don't cry. She was my most favorite person in the world. We had so much fun with her- we could eat anything we wanted, go anywhere, draw as much as we wanted, and it was so great. She was the sweetest woman ever. She would come over every day when we were in New Port News, just to help feed the numerous cats that had moved into our garage. She loved cats. We moved back over to take care of her when I was nearly eleven, and we have been here ever since. I love to remember all of the time I spent with her. I will never forget her, such a dominant force in my life. I know she is watching over me and my family right now- and smiling.

There was nobody more deserving to be called Nonnie than her.

Virginia Olivia Pittman "Nonnie" Fenwick will never be forgotten, and I hope that by sharing this with all of you, that you will remember her and honor her.

crying I'm sad for you. May her spirit rest in peace.

well, currently the family is okay...
we held a 30 minute family only viewing (all we could afford)
and she was buried in ky.,

about her, i'm glad that she actually knows who she is now, and who her family is, and where she is... i just cant stop feeling so empty. even after all of the deaths I have witnessed and had in my family, this one has certainly hit the hardest...