what really matters?

so i feel like my life has been thrown through a loop.
my grandpa is fatally ill.

it came on suddenly.

i can't wrap my head around it.

to start, i don't really even know him. i know him as my mother's father. i have seen him a handful of times in my 28 years of life, if that. i get sporadic emails from him. that i respond to in hopes of continued communication. but that usually fades into another sporadic email. its hard to come to grips with the fact that i am losing a person i was supposed to know my entire life.

he's my mother's father. he's her dad. i know what its like to have a dad. a strong and amazing dad. i can't even begin to imagine to know what it would be like if my dad were sick. let alone dying. so, i can't relate to her. i am awful at being supportive. because i have absolutely no idea what to say. but i do the best that i know, i tell her i am here for her and that i love her. hopefully, that is enough. because its all i know how to do.
i hate that she has to do this alone. essentially. i want to be there in every way that i can and that i know how. but of us vinson 4...we don't know her dad. like she does. this is a scary, paralyzing, life changing event. for her.

i feel so many emotions. but most of them are for my mom. i don't want her to hurt. i don't want her to be scared. i don't want her to be alone. i want her to know that we all are here. just as we always are. and i know she knows.....
but right now i am just so powerless and i feel helpless. because there is nothing that i can do. nothing. i live 1.5 hours away from my mom. i live across the country from my grandfather. i can do nothing.

with all of this going on, i just started a new semester. its exciting. its fresh. its my last undergraduate semester (YAYYY!) but hard to even try to get into. in the grand scheme of life....what really matters??