I still know your phone number for the house I grew up in on weekends and school holidays, At least I'm pretty sure I do. I programmed it into my phone about a year before you left and last Christmas, when I got my new phone, I finally deleted it. I cried a little then. It was like the last vestige of holding on to you.
The
last time I saw you was in 2003, I was traveling from Alaska to New Mexico with
David and Jericho. I didn't even have Aidan then. I only got to see
you for an hour or so. I regret deeply not taking more time, not hugging
you a little bit longer or helping you more, while I could. You always
had time for me, no matter when I'd call or what I needed. You were
always there.
I
find myself telling the kids stories about how I grew up and most of them
include you in some form or fashion. I smile when I tell them that you
rarely let us play on the side of the park that had playground equipment.
They look at me with shock and think that you must have been mean, but
what they don't realize is how our imaginations took flight climbing on the
rock wall in the park off Lower River Rd or while we were climbing the hills in
Gibson Park to play on the railroad tracks and venture through the tunnels that
led from Gibson Park to Riverside Park.
I
used to get so upset that you wouldn't let us play on the playground at Gibson;
you would only let us walk around the duck pond. Now I realize that I saw
so much more of my world because you did that. I looked for duck eggs and
chased seagulls and burned off so much energy. I wouldn't have done those
things if I could have played on the swing-set or gone down the slides.
I'll never forget the first time I heard you say "how cool!"
It was about a duck doing something at Gibson. I looked at you in
shock, because "cool" was not a word grandmas said.
The
other day I told the kids about how you would go out in the "country"
(all of Montana...:) ) and drop us off on the side of a dirt road and drive
waaaaaaaaaaaay down the road and park, making us walk/run/goof around until we
got to it.
I'm sure some
parents now-a-days would shit their pants with indignation, but we were outside
in the sun. We were picking Black-eyed Susans, looking for grasshoppers and racing. We were being kids. You gave us that.
Along with just forcing us to use our imaginations and to be outdoors, you also
taught me so many things. At times the lessons seemed harsh, like when I
went to you for a hug, crying, when I was 11 or 12, because Scottie had called
me ugly. You hugged me a little, but you pulled back and in your grumpy
way you asked me if I was ugly. When I said no, you said, "why cry
about it if it isn't the truth?" I have caught myself saying the
same thing to my kids when they get their feelings hurt by others. I know
they don't understand now, through the haze of hurt feelings, but I hope that
one day they will understand, like me.
I
will never forget the magic of your kitchen. It wasn't that what you
cooked was some epicurean delight, it was that it was where we lived.
Scott, Caleb and I all had our own place at your table and each place had
it's own cutting board and we all helped cook. We cut vegetables,
measured ingredients, stirred pots, and watched in awe as you made muffins out
of cornflakes, shortening, two eggs and a paperclip...wait, the paperclip was
MacGuyver, but you were just as magic as he was. You almost never
measured anything and still food came out amazing. I am not the cook you
were, but because of you I am not afraid to try things with food and in life.
In large part, because of you, I am not afraid to try new and unknown things.
In
the spring and summer we were always elbow deep in dirt. We always planted
the flowers at the church and maintained the beds. We went to the
cemetery and helped you lovingly plant beautiful flowers on the graves of your
mom and dad. I never saw you cry, but I know now that you must have been
emotional every time you did it. We also planted flowers on the graves of
several of your friends. Never did it occur to me how sad it must have
been to be the one still here. Not wishing for death, but having to go on
without the ones you had been close to, wishing, like I do with you, that you
could just pick up the phone and hear their voices. You honored them by
making their resting places beautiful.
When
I tell people now that I grew up playing in the cemetery and climbing the
cannon statue in the military section and hoping with crossed fingers that the
noises we heard (grasshoppers and bees) weren't snakes in the grass of the
REALLY old cemetery that we'd tromp around in, they look appalled that anyone
would consider the cemetery a place for kids. But I thought the old
headstones were beautiful. I made rubbings and read the dates and you
always taught us where to walk so we weren't actually walking "on"
someone. We grew respectful of those places. They piqued our
imaginations and in a way taught us that death was as normal as living and the
dead were nothing to fear.
I
never did get the chance to tell you that I am sorry I called you the
"mean grandma." I don't think I ever said it in your presence,
but I did say it. There have been so many times in the past ten years
that I have been grateful for your "meanness." All those
lessons, chores, and even the few spankings were well deserved and helped shape
me into the person I am now, the person you will never get to meet, but I think
you would be proud. Oh the many transgressions my young self counted
against you: making me fetch food out of the deep freezer from your
scary, dirt-floored basement, making me eat cooked tomatoes and squish raw
hamburger into meatloaf with my bare hands, always making us do so many chores, making us clean the garbage
that had blown in under the many pine trees in your front yard, even though the
needles scratched at our arms and the ground smelled loamy, making us take naps
and/or spend time being quiet in the afternoon; so many horrible things
you forced upon us!
I will never forget watching you crochet or that you taught me how.
I remember making yards of chain stitches with that giant ball of end
pieces left over from your many afghans or potholders. All of my stitches were
always differing sizes and tensions, but you were always so patient helping get
the knots out or to learn a new stitch. You even taught the boys, we all
had a ball of yarn and a hook. I've never gotten as good at it as you
were, silently watching Trinity Broadcast Network, the occasional chuckle or
"Amen!" coming from your direction and your fingers ever poised
crocheting away. Idle hands were never yours.
Today was a good day, Grandma. I bought the kids a dictionary. I
bet if you were here that would make you smile. I know that most people
wouldn't understand how buying a dictionary could be such a bitter sweet event,
or that it is even an event at all, but you would. I was the child of
oh-so-many questions. why? what? where? when? and I never stopped
talking. I know now how trying that can be because I have my sweet child,
Aidan, who is much the same. And while I was an inquisitive child, you
always tried to answer me or teach me to answer myself; hence the dictionary.
I will never forget the day you made me tapioca pudding. (Oh my
gosh how I love tapioca pudding!) I asked you what tapioca was and you
handed me a little spiral notebook and a pencil and told me to go look it up
and write down the definition. I'm sure I rolled my eyes and sighed that
big indignant sigh. It turns out that tapioca comes from the cassava
root. Once I knew that, I had to look up cassava. I think I was 7
or 8 years old that day and in the years following that I filled up 3 or 4 of
those notebooks with the words I didn't know the meanings of. When I was
a young adult, you gave me those notebooks. I wish I knew what I had done
with them in all these years of transient movement.
So today while shopping for a book on how to use Excel 2010 at my new
job, I saw something that made me so excited. I saw this beautiful
dictionary. No, it isn't the old beat up hardback on the bottom shelf at
your house (I wonder if that dictionary is still out there somewhere. What
I would give to flip through the pages. Would it smell like your old
house? Would I be transported back to the doorway of the guest bedroom
huddled up at the end of the couch, with a little notebook and a pencil on my
lap?)
It is shiny and new and
has 35,000 words in it many of them with illustrations and now, when my kids
ask me what a word means, I can hand them a little notebook and a pencil and
say, " Go look it up and write it down," and even though they will
have no memories of you (a fact that breaks my heart) they will still have a
piece of your legacy.
I know it is selfishness that makes me wish you wish you were still here
with me and that you were still only a phone call away. I think the
hardest part is that after all the struggles I have had in the past five or six
years, when you were always there, I am finally settled and life is so good and
I wish you could see me now. I wish you could see how happy I am and have
that comfort in your heart because I know you prayed for me and hurt for me and
wished mightily that life would be kind to me and that I would learn to be the
strong woman that I think I now am. I
wish you could see these beautiful smart kids and that I'm actually doing a
good job. I wish I could come over and sweep your floors and haul your
trash. I'd give anything in the world to help take off your shoes or
fetch you a "poppie" from the fridge and my heart hurts to know that
there will be no more "pikinicks" or days spent cooking a holiday
meal. I miss my cards on
every holiday with love from “Granny Grump.”
I love you, Grandma Maida. I hope that you went “home” and that
somehow you are at peace. I
often wonder about your life and if you felt more happiness than hurt and took
more satisfaction than disappointment. Your
life wasn’t easy and I know there were a lot of heartaches. I hope that you had
more joy than sadness and that the love you always gave so selflessly rained
down on you just as copiously. For
my part, I know you are missed and a hole has been left by your passing.
If you are out there, seeing me, know
that I am happy and rest peacefully knowing that all is well.
~Darlene
