Cup Status: Running Over
I am currently reading Inheritance by Dani Shapiro. While I am not finished with it, I am 3/4 of the way through it; it has brought to mind so many thoughts about where I have come from and the importance of family. Specifically, reading Shapiro talk about the importance of her DNA and her family lineage upon discovering that the man she knew to be her father is actually not her biological father, I began to think about my own family and the important place they have in my life as well. While I personally do not have any crazy moments like this that I have experienced, my grandpa was adopted, and thanks to Ancestry, he was able to find several members of his biological family when he was well into his 70’s. It is this grandpa and my grandma that Inheritance has brought to mind page after page. Shapiro talks about how the walls of her home are covered in the images of her ancestors and how her son wore the prayer shawl of her father for his bar mitzvah. My home is also filled with pictures of family, and I wore jewelry that belonged to my grandma on the day of my wedding.
I lost my grandparents within one day of each other in 2019. I will never forget getting the phone call about my grandpa’s death. I was teaching, and my husband called me at school. He rarely called me during the school day unless there was an emergency. He had called me on the school phone and not on my cell, which was even more concerning. We had planned to go the very next day to visit my grandpa and grandma because my grandma was not doing well. We had made the drive the weekend before to visit because we did not know how much time she had left. Little did we know that my grandpa was far worse than he had let on, though his health was not great. When I answered the phone and heard Jamie’s voice, I just knew that my grandma had passed and that I had missed my final chance to say goodbye, but when he told me he was sorry and that my grandpa had died, I felt the world tilt. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t breathe. I fell to my knees in shock. I remember saying into the phone that he wasn’t that bad off and that he was fine last weekend, as Jamie kept saying, “I know. I’m so sorry.” I remember telling him that I needed to go. I told my students to excuse me for a minute. I called my principal and asked if she could come to my classroom. I told her at the door what happened, and I went to the library to one of the study rooms for some privacy to process the news I had just received. This was the man who was there for so many of the major events of my life. He was there after the birth of my children to hold them. He danced with me at my wedding after suffering a major stroke. He said that he would recover so that we could share that dance, and it was the most special dance of my life.
Grandpa and Grandma were there for me at marching band banquets and band concerts and plays, and when I was baptized and when I needed to learn how to drive a stick shift, and no one else had the patience to teach me, and when I needed a last-minute babysitter because I was sick or when my parents were fighting, and I needed to get away. I spent whole summers at their house and brought my friends for week-long slumber parties. What made this loss even worse was that I wasn’t able to say goodbye. I had hugged him and kissed him the weekend before and told him I would see him in a few days, but I didn’t hug him long enough. I didn’t treasure that moment enough because we had more time. If only I had known. With my grandma, I was preparing my heart as best I could, but Grandpa was a shock. The next day, we drove to see Grandma and the rest of the family who had gathered to be around her and to console each other over the loss of Grandpa. I hugged my mom and my aunts and uncles. Relatives had come from far and wide to say goodbye. It was almost like the old days when we had so many people at holiday gatherings that it was standing room only. We shared grandpa stories and took turns holding grandma’s hand and sitting by her bedside. She was not aware of her surroundings anymore, and our vigil was more for us than for her. When it was my turn, I talked to her and thanked her for everything she had done for me throughout my life. She had sewn beautiful dresses for me. She altered my wedding dress; she is the only one I would trust with something so precious. She embroidered my initials onto a handkerchief for me to carry at my wedding, for the inevitable tears. She taught me how to make the best biscuits and gravy and bread pudding anyone has ever had. Her pumpkin pie is the only one that I will eat. I hate all other pumpkin pie. Every Thanksgiving and Christmas, she made a pie for each grandchild, and mine was always a custard pie. I miss those pies so much, but I miss her more. I remember when she took her last breath. Those of us who stayed through the late hour made a circle around her and told her it was ok to let go. She had lived well and loved us all, and we will all be ok because of her. We touched a part of her body and said I love you. Then, it was as if on cue, she took her last breath. My aunt, who is a nurse, took her stethoscope and checked her pulse in several places on her body. When she was certain her pulse was gone, she wrote down her time of death, and we all held each other and cried. Then, she called hospice, and the workers came, and my uncle, who is also a nurse, helped to put her body into a body bag. I think that is the strangest sight I have ever seen. I knew that the body wasn’t my grandma anymore, but those arms had hugged me so many times that to see them in a zipped-up bag was just so surreal. Never again would I watch her dexterously cross-stitch or roll out the flakiest pie dough or rock a new grandchild or great-grandchild. Never again would I call her and talk to her on the phone and ask her advice about some mundane thing.
When I pass the road where they used to live as I fly down the interstate going from place to place, I am so tempted to get off at the exit and drive the familiar path to the house where so many memories were made. What I wouldn’t give to own that house and make memories there again. Grief is a strange emotion. I will go days and days without thinking about them, and then I read a few lines in a book, and they are all I can think about. I see a cardinal out my window while I am cooking, and I think of them (the Saint Louis Cardinals were their favorite team, and they loved cardinal birds, and cardinal birds are said to be the souls of lost loved ones). Tears are streaming down my face as I type this because the pain of their loss is as real today as it was the days they died. So, I am going to write about a few memories of two of my favorite people who loved me fiercely and with their whole hearts despite having over 100 grandchildren (we have a bit of a large family…).
One of my favorite things my grandpa would do when he would stop by our house was leave a note. The note was always oddly specific and completely made up. He would say something like, “Dear Family, I stopped by at 1:08 pm and knocked on the door 7 times, but no one answered, so I let myself in. Since I was here, I did 2.5 loads of laundry using 6.25 ounces of laundry soap. I was hungry while doing the laundry, so I went into your fridge and heated up 4.75 ounces of spaghetti and drank 8.6 ounces of milk. I will pay you back for these items the next time I am in town. For now, add them to my tab. -Love, Grandpa.” The number of times he stopped in and did some chores around our house and ate some strange amount of leftovers cannot be calculated, but the notes always made me laugh. When he taught me to drive a stick shift, he gave me a report card with interesting grades as well…Grandpa is also the man who installed a sidewalk in our backyard using highway-grade rebar. Good luck to whoever tries to remove that in the future…When he built something, it was to last. Grandpa would build anything for anyone if he had the materials, and if he didn’t, he could scavenge almost anything he needed. My siblings and I wanted a playhouse. So, he got together some random materials and built us one in an afternoon. We came home from school, and there was the most perfectly built playhouse that had the oddest-looking exterior. All of the boards were different colors and textures and sizes, but when you stood back, it was the perfect little house. We loved it! When I was moving into my first apartment during college, I mentioned that I needed some furniture and asked if he could keep an eye out for me. Two weeks later, I had everything I needed, and he would not accept a dime from me. Since I was graduating in December, they even brought me a Christmas tree and a box of vintage ornaments. Grandpa and Grandma said it was a graduation present. I cried. I now had a dining table, a couch, a recliner, a desk, a washer and dryer, and a dresser. My first apartment on my own was ready!
Other favorite memories involved spending time with my two favorite people. Grandpa was a Trekie for sure. We would sit together on the couch and eat popcorn that we made in the air popper and watch Star Trek for hours. It was so much fun. I like to think it is because of Grandpa that I enjoy sci-fi as much as I do. With Grandma, it was scrapbooking. Grandpa had built a garage with an apartment above it that sat behind their main house and was connected by a breezeway. One of the bedrooms was a scrapbooking room (This later was expanded into the main area as the collection of supplies grew and grew). Grandma and I would gather our pictures and supplies, and we would scrapbook with each other, and we would talk about life and everything that was going on. I did this mostly during college and some during the summer when I began teaching. I wish that it had continued as I got older, but as I had children, life got busier and this tradition fell away, but they are some of my most treasured memories. Now, when I scrapbook or at least when I look at my scrapbooking supplies…because busy, I think of her and wish she was sitting across from me telling me about the pictures she is scrapping and the history of the people in them.
Grandpa and Grandma’s house was also for celebrations. Christmas and the Fourth of July were the big holidays that we celebrated there. Thanksgiving and Easter were celebrated at my auntie’s house. I loved going to their house for holidays. There were so many cousins to play with and so much chaos and so much good food to eat. I remember one Christmas, before they sold the Farm (as we called it), there were so many people that it was standing room only, and as people unwrapped their presents, the wrapping paper was waist-high on me (I was an adult in my early 30’s at the time), and it was over the heads of many of the smaller children. It was so much fun! I wish that we could go back to the days of Grandpa and Grandma holding court on the couch while a few of the grandchildren play elf and pass presents out to everyone, and we are all smiles and laughter, and there isn’t a care in the world. I also miss the days of the Fourth of July when the bottle rockets were as endless as the barbecue pork steaks that my uncles were grilling on the barrel grills. We saved our pennies for weeks so that we could buy as many fireworks as possible at the tents that sprang up at the beginning of July, begging our parents for more money when we inevitably put more in our baskets than we could afford. Then, the hoards of cousins blew up as much as possible while trying not to light themselves on fire, while adults were off playing horseshoes, not concerning themselves with us at all. We would play in the “galvanized pool,” aka horse trough, and have a grand time until the food was finished. Then we would go into the air-conditioned garage where we held many of our celebrations (my own engagement party and many of the birthday parties for my firstborn were held in this garage as well) to load up our plates. The day ended with a huge fireworks display set off by the uncles and the braver of the cousins while we sat on blankets or in lawn chairs saying, “OOOHHHH AAAAHHHH!!!!!” Then we would go home or stay the night with Grandpa and Grandma.
These are the days that I dream of. I can close my eyes and still feel my bare feet walking on the night-cool grass, my eyes adjusting from the dark night to the brighter lights of the garage/apartment as I approach Grandpa and Grandma’s house after the amazing fireworks. I can hear the sounds of bugs and frogs in the night air. I can smell the sulfur wafting on the wind and the sweet smell of summer. Then I feel the cool of the air conditioning as I enter the garage, and then the crushing embrace of my grandma with her telltale smell of perfume, something slightly powdery and floral at the same time, mixed with the sweet sweat of summer. “Did you have a good day?” She asks. “Do I have to go home?” I ask as usual. But the truth is, home is always where she is and where he is. I think that’s why I miss them so much. I feel unmoored without them. Homeless almost. Like, my heart doesn’t know where to land some days. Because if home is wherever I am with you, what happens when you are gone?
The Cup 
Leave a comment