My grandmas are gone.
Both of them.
I haven't written once since last year, when my mom's mother died. It happened on May 18th, mid morning, at what my mom and most of the local nurses call the "Death Star" (otherwise known as the Intermountain Medical Center in Murray).
This year, here I am again because yet again, on May 18th, at the "Death Star," mid morning, my grandma died. This time it was my dad's mom...Is this some kind of crazy trick? Both grandmas gone within one year? After they've been around your entire life?! It's quite a shock to say the least.
Death is one of those things you know is going to happen sometime, and we expect it to happen sooner or later, particularly to our elderly loved ones, but that doesn't mean it doesn't come as a surprise when it actually happens. Or makes it any less hard to face.
grandma great with her grandchildren ella and callynn, august 2009
My Grandma Rogers was going to live forever. She was 87 years old, but I always thought she would keep on living forever. Grandma rogers was in relatively good health and good spirits whenever I saw her, which made me believe she was invincible and would always be around.
She had always been independent and mobile; she still lived in the same house where she raised her three kids; the house I always knew as grandma rogers' house. This was the same house she cared for her sick husband (my grandmpa) during the last three years of his life. The same house we could never find her at later because she kept herself so "busy busy busy". The same house we would take turns going to on Saturdays growing up: we'd help grandma do a project, like painting or cleaning, weeding or planting the tomatoes and marigolds in the backyard. It wouldn't be a very long project (until we got a little older) and when we were finished we would spend the rest of the day doing fun things.
Everything was better at grandma's house. She had games we didn't- like croquet and badmitten, skip bo and uno, boggle and yahtzee. And always had a cookie jar full of cookies. We'd go out to get lunch at KFC or Article circle (which was a big treat to an 8 year old and places my parents rarely took us), then we'd bring it home and eat it on grandma's plates with grandma's sliverwear and wash it down with grandma's sprite in grandma's cups with grandma's colorful bendy straws. Sometimes we'd even have a picnic on the back patio with the AstroTurf floor. When grandpa was still alive, but sick in his hospital bed at home, we would go get banana shakes for all of us, and we'd help give grandpa his banana shake out of a bendy straw- I think that's why she always had them around, but maybe it's because they were fun for us too. Banana shakes are still my favorite.
Even years later, after we'd all grown up, I'd moved away and come back, she'd still keep herself busy. On more than one occasion I would drop by her house to visit and she wouldn't be home! It was hard to find her at home because she was always out and about having lunch dates with her sisters, bingo games at the senior center, volunteering with the Utah Daughters of the Pioneers, seeing plays at the Hayl Center Theatre, or going on weekend bus trips...I honestly don't know what all my grandma did everyday except that she somehow managed to also keep her house spotless and tidy, her yard weeded and mowed, and she would faithfully ride her stationary bike every morning for half an hour. She also was very conscious of her nutrition, cooked herself balanced meals (many in her crockpot), went to church every Sunday and played lots of cards with my aunt Janet and Janet's friend Brenda...
Some of my favorite memories of grandma are from the holidays: 4th of July, Thanskgiving and Christmas. Almost every Christmas, grandma would take us to the Hayl Center Theatre to see "A Christmas Carol" matinee together. The same actor played Scrooge for years and grandma was so impressed with him every year and would tell us, year after year "He was soooo good! Can you believe he jumped up on that bed like that? He's just soooo talented! I can't believe that man can do things like that..." Then every year without fail, though the story didn't change, grandma would jump when jacob marley's ghost showed up on the door. And we would all laugh together. Afterward we would always go out to eat at a local chain diner like Applebees or Chile's.
On Christmas eve, we drove to Grandma Rogers' house- she had little white lights in her front window and her rainbow colored tree in the living room with her shiny ball ornaments mixed with kids' ornaments and icicles that Janet and the grand-kids had helped put up a couple of weeks before. There was always lots of food that always included shrimp appetizer over cream cheese dip, baked beans, funeral potatoes with cornflakes on top, rolls for turkey or ham and cheese sandwiches, a veggie tray with dip, and olives and pickles (sweet and dill though I think my grandma was the only one that ever ate the sweet ones). Just like Thanksgiving, there would be as many sweets for dessert as there were main dishes for dinner. After our feast, we would gather in the living room to hear the story of Christ. When we were little we would dress up as different characters from the nativity and recreate the story of christ's birth while someone read the story from the bible. When we got older, we stopped dressing up, but would still read the story (even though some of us didn't go to church anymore), open presents with grandma and our aunts, uncle, and cousins and sometimes even sing Christmas carols. Even though grandma didn't have an amazing singing voice, she was never shy to sing. Grandma always kept the Christ in Christmas.
Thanksgiving was the other holiday where we would spend some special time with grandma. The granddaughters (Cass, Beth and I) would sleep over at grandma's house the night before Thanksgiving with the task of making dessert. Not just one dessert, however, but a whole slew of desserts ranging from fudge and rice krispies (staple grandma treats) to carrot pudding, pie and anything else we could find from the LionHouse cookbook. And of course not just one pie; we always had to have pumpkin and then usually at least two other flavors: typically apple and pecan. We would stay up late making dish after dish, playing cards and games while waiting for the baked goods to be done. Then we'd wake up "early" the next morning to help make all the savory dishes. By the time we rolled out of bed, probably around 8 or 9 (early for us grand daughters) grandma would have already showered and primped, basted, stuffed and started roasting the turkey and would be joyfully humming while starting on another dish. She would make sure that we slept well and would offer us something to eat for breakfast, then we would get right to work making all the preparations before the rest of the family showed up at 1pm for Thanksgiving dinner: cutting up lettuce for the sarah salad, peeling yams and potatoes for mashed potatoes and marshmallow yams...Even when I didn't come home for Thanksgiving for a few years during college, I would still keep her traditions and make sure that everyone had plenty of desserts to choose from, including carrot pudding.
For the 4th of July, we loved going over to grandma's. The night before there was usually a big fireworks show at Granite High School by her house. We would all pack our lawn chairs and blankets and grandma would bring us snacks like cracker jacks, popcorn balls and salt water taffy. We would all stake out a spot among the crowds of families on the grass, then talk and wait until it got dark and the fireworks came. It seemed like they lasted for hours; we would guess what color was coming next and make jokes and laugh a lot. Grandma was always laughing with us. On the 24th of July, a state holiday here in Utah, we would go to a pioneer parade in the morning which usually invovled lots more sweets and laughs, and then that night we would go over to grandma's house to light sparklers and fountain fireworks in front of her house. All of us kids, especially the boys, would be out in the street lighting things while the adults would sit in lawn chairs on the side walk and grandma would be worrying the whole time "be careful kurty" "oh, not so close" "Hurry hurry hurry." We had a bucket of water close by to ease grandma's nerve's a little. Even though she was worried sick and honestly probably hated watching the little kids lighting things on fire, she knew it made us happy and so let us do it every time, giving us gentle words of loving caution before the lighting of each one. We laughed at her worried-ness and she laughed too saying" you're worrying your poor old grandma". I realized later that was one of grandma's greatest traits-she knew how to laugh at herself. Not in a self-loathing way, but in a fun and loving way that kept things silly and entertaining for us children.
Looking through pictures of grandma after she died, I realized that holidays, birthdays, weddings and graduations were the times when we would see our grandma the most. But she would always do her best to make it to other events of ours too, no matter how small. When I was probably 12 my grandma came to some softball games when my parents were still at work; when I was on the highschool cross country team she showed up to some of my races when no one else could (even though I was only on junior varsity). Whenever I had art shows in high school, or even middle school, she would come to see my work and when I won an award from the governor, she even made the effort to show up at the capitol to congratulate me. When my mom and I sang in the church choir for christmas, she always came to the performance. Then, when I graduated college, which was not conveniently located in downtown Salt Lake City, but way up in rural, progressive Arcata, California, five hours North of the San Francisco Bay up in the redwood forests and foggy coastlines with hippy college students abounding, she flew on a small, bumpy, crowded propeller airplane, (one of the adventures of her life I am told) to make it all the way up there and see me walk to receive my degree. She even came to a little party afterwards and listened to my friends and I sing folk songs and play the guitar at one of their crazy student hippy college houses.
I know she did things like this for all of us grandkids; she cared about us and she knew how to make us feel special, loved and important.
My grandma loved me very much. Apparently she worried about me a lot too (I hope I didn't cause her too much grief) during all of my crazy international and backcountry adventures, but even though she didn't always understood why I choose to do the things I do, or even knew the full extent of what I was really doing, she always supported me and made an effort to show interest in the things I cared about. She even sent me an e-mail a few times when I was away to keep in touch, even though we all knew she never had a fondness for computers.
I love my grandma and I'm grateful that we got to spend 28 years together! She helped take care of me from the time I was a baby with my twin brother and she has very much helped to shape the person I have become. I will miss her dearly and hope I can carry on her legacy by following the example that she led.
Some traits I inherited from my grandmother:
-A big sweet tooth
-A love for baking and cooking
-A love for gardening
-the ability to get my hands dirty
-hard work
-pride in my pioneer heritage
-making decisions carefully (aka indecisiveness)
-getting along with everyone
-making an effort to make sure everyone is included
-kindness
-dislike for medication
-determination to do things on my own
Things I learned from my grandma:
-what the "soft ball" stage is in fudge making
-how to make the best flaky pie crust-->buy it.
-laugh at yourself
-gardening gloves restrict your work
-it's important to make people feel comfortable
-make sure others are taken care of before yourself
-take the scenic route; avoid the freeway
-patience (have you ever made carrot pudding?)
-hide valuables in unlikely places: garage door opener in the pantry, purse in the dryer, rings in the clock and cash in the dictionary.
- pull the weeds, don't spray them
-plant marigolds and tomatoes in your garden
-thinning beets is hard work
-strategy
-how to play skip-bo, uno, 5 crowns, Yahtzee, croquet and badmitten
-how to use a calculator
-wash a stain with cold water and soap before you put it in the washing machine
-be accepting
-be cautious
-be caring
-be smart
Things I admired in my grandma:
-Her faithfulness to her beliefs
-Her willingness to do what needed to be done without complaint
-she was always on time or early
-Her good attitude
-Her determination
-Her loving-kindness towards others
-Her sense of humor
-Her joy in simple pleasures
-her love and dedication to family
-her openness to things she didn't necessarily agree with or understand
-her pride in her hometown of draper and her farm-girl upbringing
-her respect for herself and for others
-her bravery to stand up for what she wanted, especially during those last days
-her courage to live the life she wanted to live and accept death when it came
Things I will miss:
-her smile
-her laugh
-her sweet face with her mascaraed blue eyes and splotchy mauve lipstick
-her ability to lose an entire game, then come up from behind at the last minute and win
-her freckled arms and hands with her opal flower ring and small gold watch
-her perfectly curled, orange-dyed hair and her matching painted on eyebrows
-the way she walked, so deliberately and steadily in her square heeled shoes
-Her insistence on avoiding the freeway at all costs
-Her stories, especially of the family farm in draper
-Her strength of character
-Her positive spirit
-Her endurance and energy
-my grandma
So I just keep telling myself, death is a part of life. At the end, we kind of knew my grandma was about to die, so I kind of expected her to leave me with some profound message or advice, but when she didn't I realized that she didn't need to. She said so much more not in any final words, but in how she lived her life. Life is about spending time together with your family, enjoying the simple times together and making sure to laugh along the way.
You truly were the best grandma ever. I hope I can be like you when I'm 87.
We'll miss you!
