Connection...

I'm delighted to say I have talked to my grandmother more times in the past two months than I have talked to her in the previous 37 years.

Alright, that's probably a major exaggeration, but I really am happy about it. My dad's mother is the one family member of that generation that I could turn to and say, for better or worse, that I am VERY much like. I have her ability to tell a story as well as her ability to stretch the honest truth. I possess her desire to take care of people, which also leads into that secret desire for others to return the same sort of affection. She and I both talk a good game and don't ever seem to STOP talking. I could go on and on, but when I look at her, I see all my heritage, the craziness, the love of those long wild trips to the coast, the need for social interaction and the sudden need to be alone with a good book (and the need to be alone so that someone can say, "Come be with me instead of hanging around here alone!") I'm all those things wrapped up in a shorter, darker skinned package (except the hair that I added on, which I did take off later, but I REALLY still like the picture!).

This all started when my mother's mother Lucy (the one we called Granny) passed. Granny was the serious one, the grandmother that made you listen to her and made you behave and didn't give you everything you wanted, so you grew to love her later in life. My other grandmother, Lula (Shug, as we called her) was the "fun" grandma that bought you things and gave you money and never really spanked you until she'd just lost it. Between the two of them, we had a full parent when we went to visit. Shug would play with you and Granny would do the disciplining.

As we got older, we started to really understand Granny more and heard less from Shug, who was doing a lot with other family members that were ill or needed support. We began to appreciate the effort that Granny had put into us as much as the fun that Shug had had with us. My parents (who were in better shape financially as my brother and I got older) started having Granny fly in for visits more often while Shug was out of town with her brothers and sisters. I created a different, but equal strong bond with Granny that stemmed from her connection with her daughter and my understanding of that circle. But Granny had emphysema and was in and out of hospice for quite a while in 2006 until she finally stopped eating and slipped away at the end of August. I think a little piece of all of us went with her. My mother, of course, lost her mother, but my father lost a close friend in Lucy, and I lost a connection to quite a few things, not the least of which was understanding the place I hold in the continuing mother-daughter cycle.

Meanwhile, Shug, who had always been in supremely good health (walking miles was never an issue for her) was losing her independence after having fallen and hurt herself some months before. When the younger Granny passed, Shug suddenly realized that time was slipping away from HER, too. The family members she'd nutured and taken care of had began to pass on or, in the case of the younger generation, leave her behind the way we tend to do with our older relatives. We stop listening, stop coming and then stop caring.

Living farther away, I was able to appreciate both women and what they meant in my life, so I was constantly inviting them to my home and visiting when I could afford it. Granny could never have made it to my place (she was VERY allergic to cats and her emphysema wouldn't have let her do more than stand outside this home) but Shug always had reasons. They usually consisted of someone else that she had to go help or be with and it took me quite a while before I realized why. She spent her whole life doing for others in the vague hope that they would someday do for her. It made her feel good to help other family members and people, but it also made her feel needed and therefore loved. I don't think she really knew what to do with a grandchild that only wanted to have her come so she could enjoy her company and take care of her, not force her to cook or watch children or even get out of bed if she didn't want to. Kevin and I were more than willing to let Shug just BE here and share with her the places we loved. Even when we went to see HER in Florida, I think it was a shock to have us washing dishes and feeding ourselves and even buying her a new car battery and changing it out when it died.

Anyway, she came to stay with us for the Christmas holiday and we had a ball. We didn't even do something every day...there were days when we all three just sat in the house and read books to ourselves, but didn't say a word to each other. We hauled her all over creation when we DID go out...took her to the wildlife refuge (where she and Kevin just about married each other in their love of the outdoors and the wildlands!), we took her to Toronto for a two day trip and we even drove her around town to some of the closer places to look at (being Native American herself, she marveled at the two refuges within driving distance of us). She REALLY wanted to see snow, but in a bizarre twist, the Buffalo area had no snow the last few weeks of December.

And now she's calling us about twice a month. It's really nice hearing from her, actually. It's this connection to my past that I really am starting to treasure more and more now that I live so far from my family of origin. She did show me one thing while she was here that I found incredibly upsetting. Because of her health issues (bad vertigo, major hearing loss and even some memory issues) she'd made up a little card that she was very proud of. It said "My name is Lula (last name omitted here) and I live at (address omitted). If I am found, please contact my granddaughter in New York at..." and then she had listed our names and addresses, as well as my cousins in our hometown and all the other pertinent info needed to make sure she didn't end up lost somewhere. At 5'8", my grandmother had always been this imposing, yet friendly Amazon of a Native American princess to me. To see her suddenly reduced to...well, a senior citizen, was nearly more than I could stand. She wanted me to tell her if it all looked good and would make sense to a stranger that might read it and I had to tell her a story about something in my eye while Kevin read the card for me.

I had a tough time for a little while after that...I FINALLY had her, only to realize I was that much close to losing her. Funny how just when you think you've got all the pieces of the puzzle in place, you suddenly look under the rug and find some TOTALLY different piece that obviously fits into the same puzzle and you have to readjust...

Still, I'm glad to have her back in my life and I hope we get her back up here once more. Nothing in the world is funnier than a grandmother who can tell terrible stories with your husband...not sure which was worse, his dried apricot story or her fresh coconut story (for the general jist of both stories, try eating your fill of either of these and see what happens)!

Glurge and Christmas Cards

Glurge is what the Urban Legends website calls any of those heart wrenching stories that people stuff your e-mail box with. Each story usually ends with something like "and that little handicapped boy grew up to be...Winston Churchill" or "and that small act of kindness saved his life all those years ago" or "So cherish these moments with your loved ones...you might not get another chance"!

This would all be well and good if not for two problems. First, these always end with some huge guilt trip, like "You can keep this and pretend it meant nothing to you or send it on to others and make a difference", or "I love you enough to send it to you....will you send it back to me?" It almost FORCES you to send it back to someone like your boss or someone you really might NOT be that close with (not unlike Christmas cards!). Worse yet is the ones that flat out TELL you that it's a chain mail, completely destroying ANY attempt at being a life changing, sentimental note. Real affection would be shown by you calling me up and telling me this story, not by forwarding it on and on to other e-mail addresses. Trust me, I won't think less of you for keeping this gem until we get together personally! :-)

The second thing that makes these hard to stomach is the fact that EVERYONE sends them over and over as forwards to tons of friends instead of copying it into a more personal individual e-mail or at least adding a personal note to me to explain why you sent it. This falls into the category of Christmas cards, too. I don't mind when folks actually WRITE in their cards, but when you just send me a card with nothing more than a quick signature, especially when I have heard from you in months or more, then I know that I'm just another one of the folks on your card list. I don't mind the family picture cards ('cause those update me visually on how you are) and general holiday newsletters (because those give me info, too, even though it's for everyone and not just me). Heck, I can even take e-mail cards, as long as you SAY a little something in them. But Christmas cards with a quick "Love, the Franklin Family" just end up in the garbage later. They're like chain e-mails...I'm on your list, so I get one, but other than that, there's no real thought in them at all

So, how do you get around this? Don't send me the whole story. E-mail me (or call) with your summarized version of the story so I know what YOU got out of it. When my students bring me a book report that pretty much just has the exact Cliff Notes version of the book, I give them an F. When they personally tell me what they thought of the book and what they got out of it, they get A's. It shows they took the time to really understand the story and that's what make other kids learn from it and want to find out more. As adults, we could do the same. If you really want someone to benefit from an uplifting story, don't chain mail it. Relate it to that person you care about and they'll relate a LOT better to you.