This is a Chicken Soup for the Soul daily email which I received several weeks ago;

hope that you enjoy it as much as I did!

Afraid of the Night
By Nancy Harless

Death came to call most often in the early morning
hours. Sometimes peacefully, taking my patient as he
dreamed. Sometimes violently, with a rattle deep in the
throat. Sometimes Death came like a refreshing breeze and
carried away my long-suffering patient like a buoyant kite
cut loose in the wind, leaving her pain behind. Sometimes
it was only after much pumping and pounding and fluids and
medications and electrical shocking that we allowed Death
to come. But, for whatever rationale, it was my personal
observation that Death came to call most frequently in the
early morning hours, and for that solitary reason I came to
dread the night shift.

Until Olga.

Olga was a terminal-cancer patient whose family could
no longer endure the hardship of caring for her at home.
It was the family decision, with this strong matriarch
leading the family, to place her in one of the beds our
tiny hospital designated for long-term, palliative care.
Olga firmly insisted they pay only for thirty days because
she had chosen the fourth of July to be her "freedom day" -
her chosen day to die. Her doctor, on the other hand,
stated his expectations. Although she was terminal, she
would probably live three to six months, and her demise
would be a slow and probably very painful process. He gave
orders to provide comfort measures and allow complete
freedom for family visitation.

The family came faithfully every day, often staying
for hours talking or just sitting with Olga and listening
to the radio perpetually playing the Christian music she
loved. When the song "I Give You Love" would play, Olga
smiled broadly and announced, "That's my favorite song.
That's the last song I want to hear when I die."

On the night of July third, I came on duty as charge
nurse for the night shift. According to report, Olga's
family had been in to see her that evening and left
instructions for the nurses not to call them if "it
happened," as they had all said their good-byes. "Please
allow Reverend Steve to sit with her," they said. "He
wants to accompany her in her passage."

With the warped humor only nurses understand, the evening shift joked,
"Olga's vital signs are stable and there's nothing
physiologically to indicate her death is imminent. Lucky
you. You're going to have to deal with Olga in the
morning, and boy is she going to be mad that she's still
here!"

But, things are different at night. Night is when we
are closer to ourselves, and closer to our cardinal truths
and ideas. I checked on Olga and, pulling her covers up
around her shoulders, whispered, "Good night, beautiful
lady."

Olga smiled and whispered back, "Good night and good-
bye. You know, tomorrow is my freedom day." A warm sense
of calm settled about my shoulders - a strong but strangely
comforting awareness that she might be right, even though
it went against logic, reason and educated predications.
Though her vital signs were unchanged, I left the room
feeling Olga was very much in control of her destiny.
Throughout the night, Mary, the other nurse on duty,
and I turned Olga and provided care. Reverend Steve sat
holding her hand, and together they listened as the radio
softly played one song after another. When we returned to
her room mid-shift, Olga did not arouse as we gently
repositioned her.

At 6:00 a.m., just as the sun cast a warm rosy glow
through the windows, Mary and I returned to her room.
Reverend Steve requested we wait just a few minutes as he
felt Olga was "almost through her passage." As I stood at
the foot of her bed watching this young minister
accompanying Olga to her journey's door, I was filled with
awe and a sense of envy of the mastery this strong and
beautiful woman had over her life. Out of habit, I checked
my watch and began counting her respirations, one - two -
three. At that moment, a song began on the radio and a
smile spread over Olga's sleeping face. "I Give You Love"
- four - five - six. . . .

Olga accomplished not one, but two of her last life
goals. The Fourth of July was her day of freedom from the
pain of her disease. And the last song she ever heard was
her favorite.

I have often remembered that night over the years and
felt that Olga's story should be told. Because this strong
and beautiful woman chose not to "rage against the dying of
the light," but to accept it - even welcome it - as entry
into the light. Because of Olga I have a much deeper
appreciation for endings and beginnings, for the cycles of
life and death.

And, because of Olga, I no longer fear the night.