Now We are the Miller Six

Miller Six

It is a November evening when I get the text from my sister. I am tired from a day of wondering and worrying about one of my sisters and her health. We are the Miller Six, but my older sister sends a text – the first one ever labeled Miller Five. 

When we were kids, they called us the Miller Six. Though we sang infrequently in churches, we were always introduced as the Miller Six. When our youngest brother died following a stroke, his family asked the Miller Six to sing at his funeral.  A few years later our oldest brother passed, and we fulfilled his request that his younger sisters – the Miller Six – sing at his funeral. Both times, we enlisted the help of our children who were present.

Miller Five

This time when the text shows up on my phone, it is labeled Miller Five. It is a first, and I stare at the label. The knot in my stomach tightens until tears come. I cannot believe we are here. The six of us are in our seventies, and cancer has reared its ugly head, again. We are waiting for more tests and more visits with specialists. Cancer is not new to us, but in the past, we have survived every diagnosis. Our Whatsapp group, labeled Miller Six, keeps us informed of each one’s progress.

But on this evening, the text group is a new one: Miller Five. I am sobered and sad.

Then, several months later, there is another text from the same sister. It is also labeled Miller Five. This text excludes a different sister. There’s a medical crisis and the text-sending-sister is reporting from the hospital. She keeps us informed while we pray. The texts (and exclusion of one sister in the texts) are necessary, but the reason hurts. 

Reminiscing together

Yearly in November, we six get together to celebrate our mother’s birthday. We eat Hickory Nut Cake – her favorite – in her memory. Our spouses request a different cake, but the six of us eat Hickory Nut cake together every year. It takes us back to our childhood when we went to the pasture to pick hickory nuts in the fall for our mama’s birthday cake. We cracked those nuts, using a hammer on a large stone, and picked out the meat for her cake.

In previous years, geographics sometimes kept us from all being together at our annual celebration of her birthday. Yet this year, it is not geographics, but cancer that prevents travel for everyone. We are sisters. When one of us cannot be there, it is not the same.

Weeks turn into months, where we track chemo days for two sisters and monitor a hospital visit for a third sister. One sister comes from Nebraska and I go home from Virginia so we can be together for a few days. 

When that second text labeled Miller Five arrives, I stare at it again. There’s a knot in my stomach that refuses to go away. Is this signaling the end of an era?  Will there be healing for which we’ve prayed so long, or are we going to go from six to five?  Will we still be the Miller Six when one of us is no longer alive?

Now we are the Miller Six. What happens when we are no longer six, but five? Will we still be the Miller Six, or will we become the Miller Five?