hell hath no fury like a granddaughter scorned...
family calling hours were tonight for my great grandfather. his name was paul. he was very nice.
i should add here that i have never really lived up to the weird expectations of my extended family. I am too quiet for them or something, and i live in boardman, i don't really understand it. but regardless, let's just say that i've always felt a little guilty around them.
anyway, at the end of tonight when everyone is saying goodbye, i wait for a long time to see my great grandmother, whom we call "granny" (we called him "pap") to tell her that i love her and everything.
So I get up there and she looks at me for a second and kind of mumbles something. I ask her what and she says "How old are you?" I tell her seventeen. It is one of the only things i get to say. Seventeen. She says something confusing about my sisters, then asks me how many I have. I say one. Katie. Oh... She is vague. Then she looks at my eyes, and very clearly, very carefully says, "Well you can't expect me to remember that, I haven't seen you for years. Pap used to always ask me why you never came to see us, and I would say, you can't expect them to want to. We are old. Anyway, nice to see you again."
My response? Open-mouthed shock. It was as though I'd put my hand on the stove. Later my cousin suggested that she hadn't known what she was saying, but I really think she did. Reading over it now, I didn't quite capture the jagged edges of everything she said, or the pain i felt. It was as though she'd said "you killed him."
so that is where i am.
it is difficult, this business of needing.
i should add here that i have never really lived up to the weird expectations of my extended family. I am too quiet for them or something, and i live in boardman, i don't really understand it. but regardless, let's just say that i've always felt a little guilty around them.
anyway, at the end of tonight when everyone is saying goodbye, i wait for a long time to see my great grandmother, whom we call "granny" (we called him "pap") to tell her that i love her and everything.
So I get up there and she looks at me for a second and kind of mumbles something. I ask her what and she says "How old are you?" I tell her seventeen. It is one of the only things i get to say. Seventeen. She says something confusing about my sisters, then asks me how many I have. I say one. Katie. Oh... She is vague. Then she looks at my eyes, and very clearly, very carefully says, "Well you can't expect me to remember that, I haven't seen you for years. Pap used to always ask me why you never came to see us, and I would say, you can't expect them to want to. We are old. Anyway, nice to see you again."
My response? Open-mouthed shock. It was as though I'd put my hand on the stove. Later my cousin suggested that she hadn't known what she was saying, but I really think she did. Reading over it now, I didn't quite capture the jagged edges of everything she said, or the pain i felt. It was as though she'd said "you killed him."
so that is where i am.
it is difficult, this business of needing.