my father's mother
my father's mother
it's so strange and surreal to watch these events unfold. the fact that i'm distanced adds to it an extra strain of helplessness and a lack of feeling connected to things you find so important.
she's laying on her deathbed, too weak to hold even a pen and too stubborn to eat but she doesn't want to be there. she wants to be home and her thinking has lost logic.
the family is falling apart and things are going in a million different directions.
so strange just how much impact ONE life can have. one little old lady and a slip down the stairs and how many lives get thrown into turmoil over it because they all love her and everything is just fucked.
my dad. my poor father. his normal life was stressful enough with his body falling apart and millions of government set appointments for workers comp and income just barely trickling in. now his mother is dying and he is upset about that but also has to handle all of her affairs and figure out what to do with his mentally disabled younger brother who has been coddled all his life and just can't grasp that his mother is dying.
my little brother is ready to tell people who are trying to cause drama to just get the fuck out of our lives. this is no time to pull this shit. drama with my sisters is pooling over onto my grandmother's death bed and it has nothing to do with her. he's such a protector and i know trying to protect everybody all at once while working his job and trying to take care of dad is wearing him down.
and today is easter. a holiday i always associated with my grandparents...
what my grandparents symbolized to me was always the standard. the unshakable foundation. the only constant stable thing in my life. i grew up hopping all over the country with my parents and my home life was always rift with drama and turmoil. nothing ever stayed the same, everything c hanging. one minute to the next, not staying some place less than six moths to 4 years at max and that was no where near the average. but my grandmother and grandfather? they were always the same. always in the same place. always the same amount of love. stable. they were stable and constant in my life. the house to this very MOMENT is still exactly the same, even though my grandfather died when i was a teenager.
and it will all be gone. the only stability i ever had since the moment i was pushed into this world. all that stability and constant will be shot. grandma won't be cooking sunday dinners or dressing up the place for holidays. there won't even be that house anymore. i won't hear her laugh or see her give somebody a cute glare. her curly grey hair and wearing my grandfather's glasses to read. her flashiness and instance on class on the strangest of matters.
to know her now, you wouldn't call her warm and fuzzy, but she was. she was. she got stoney very slowly after the passing of pops, but if you caught her at the right moments, you would see it all melted away from time to time. small presents from people of things she really enjoyed, feeding my dog and swearing at her in italian (just like her mother did with her own dog), hand written letters, seeing people enjoying her cooking, helping her clean up...
she was also a very strong woman. lost her daughter to jaundice before they knew hoe to cure it. a mentally handicapped son in an era where they just lumped all the mental disabilities into one clump and tried to shove it all away. husband jailed and having to take care of two boys all alone while still trying to keep up appearances. a stubborn woman who ended up marrying the exact same man her brothers told her to go no where near and loving him even past his death. a lover of martinis made of nothing but vodka in a martini glass and a green olive to make it look like a drink a proper lady would have, and only in public. scratch of lottery tickets and made you swore to secrecy if you won one for her. fine dining chinese food. Elisabeth Taylor perfume. Beatrix Potter stories and art. Fabergé eggs and Hummel figurines. pride for everything her and her husband worked their lives for and the past few years watching it all decay with failing health and fiances plummeting.
the amount of memories i have of that house and of them are so numerous i can look at a photo of the room and see the memories move like images of a moving picture, transparent, and overlapping one another.
working in the garden. sunbathing in the garden. playing in the garden. feeding birds in the garden.
sitting on the front porch and carving pumpkins. sitting on the front porch and eating watermelons. sitting on the front porch and talking with the renter upstairs. sitting on the fort porch and playing games with my grandparents.
sitting at the kitchen table and every breakfast i had there as a child handmade by my grandfather with special care, love, and attention to details. every sunday dinner my grandmother made for us after he passed. she may have been surly but she insisted on us eating together and her making it. she insisted on family being together at least once a week for a meal.
sitting in the dining room for every holiday meal we had together. every easter, thanksgiving, and christmas that we were in driving distance or when my dad and brother moved upstairs. they all over lap each other. we always sat in the same spots and i can see each face transparent over the others in their various states and ages and emotional content.
and the living room. where i played quietly as a child with the doll that was meant for my aunt who passed as a child. playing with the coasters as if they were plates to a tea set. i know exactly where those coasters are now because they are always in the same spot.
always.
did you know when i was 19 i moved in with my grandmother for the summer so i could take care of her after one of her back surgeries? when she wasn't quit fit yet and needed help with house work. i worked at her brother's restaurant part time to have money to do things while in the city and to take grandma out sometimes. helped her get to and from doctor appoints on the bus and and she showed me how to cheat the system and get free bus and train rides and where the lost and found was at the restaurant. that woman was sly.
when she passes, the only stable things i've known in my short 33 years will go. she was the last bastion of stability in my life before steven. her, that house, and everything about that life will crumble apart and vanish. the memories won't but the actual reality based components of it will be.
that house was a monument. no, that house was a TEMPLE. a REFUGE. my grandparents were some sort of gods and keepers. when she passes, she will fade to whatever and where ever. hopefully with my grandfather and all those of her time that passed before her. but that house? that house is being sold due to a reverse mortgage she needed to take out to survive. it'll go to some one else. somebody who won't understand all the ghosts of my memories are constantly playing over each other. they might be swept away when they move in. sweeping away the stability i had in those moments, in those times. in those memories that will have no value to a newcomer. a new comer who will transform that temple into something else. not the meticulous eye and style of my grandparents who made everything look so amazing and worked hard to own all the amazing things they had.
i'm not just losing my grandmother, but i'm loosing the last strand of everything connected stable, constantly warm and loving childhood memories. i'm plenty full of unstable childhood memories. both warm and violent and scary that moved on whims and screamed and smashed walls and caught gentle breezes and laughter and giggles.
but it's the anchor of it all...
my grandmother is the last anchor of that life, and when she passes she's lifting it up and sailing away. taking it all with her. i'll gladly make that an offering to whatever may be out there, but i know it's going to leave such a gap in my life. i know the value of all of those memories, at least to me. right now. at this very moment. but there is no way i can comprehend the value of every one of them all at once. no human can. i will feel the value of them after they are gone and i will feel how much it hurts to remember them and THAT is the moment i will know their true value. right now, i just have an idea. a ballpark. and i know me. i'm human. i'm underselling it. those things show you their worth and it's something you could never even think of. never imagine. never know till you realize you can't have it again.
i love my grandmother. the strong, beautiful, stubborn woman. Lucille Rispoli D'Angelo.
right now she's preparing for her voyage. i will be crushed to know when she pulls up anchor even though i know she's going, but i also know where ever she's heading will treat her better than the struggle of the last few weeks, the last few months, the last few years.
it's so strange and surreal to watch these events unfold. the fact that i'm distanced adds to it an extra strain of helplessness and a lack of feeling connected to things you find so important.
she's laying on her deathbed, too weak to hold even a pen and too stubborn to eat but she doesn't want to be there. she wants to be home and her thinking has lost logic.
the family is falling apart and things are going in a million different directions.
so strange just how much impact ONE life can have. one little old lady and a slip down the stairs and how many lives get thrown into turmoil over it because they all love her and everything is just fucked.
my dad. my poor father. his normal life was stressful enough with his body falling apart and millions of government set appointments for workers comp and income just barely trickling in. now his mother is dying and he is upset about that but also has to handle all of her affairs and figure out what to do with his mentally disabled younger brother who has been coddled all his life and just can't grasp that his mother is dying.
my little brother is ready to tell people who are trying to cause drama to just get the fuck out of our lives. this is no time to pull this shit. drama with my sisters is pooling over onto my grandmother's death bed and it has nothing to do with her. he's such a protector and i know trying to protect everybody all at once while working his job and trying to take care of dad is wearing him down.
and today is easter. a holiday i always associated with my grandparents...
what my grandparents symbolized to me was always the standard. the unshakable foundation. the only constant stable thing in my life. i grew up hopping all over the country with my parents and my home life was always rift with drama and turmoil. nothing ever stayed the same, everything c hanging. one minute to the next, not staying some place less than six moths to 4 years at max and that was no where near the average. but my grandmother and grandfather? they were always the same. always in the same place. always the same amount of love. stable. they were stable and constant in my life. the house to this very MOMENT is still exactly the same, even though my grandfather died when i was a teenager.
and it will all be gone. the only stability i ever had since the moment i was pushed into this world. all that stability and constant will be shot. grandma won't be cooking sunday dinners or dressing up the place for holidays. there won't even be that house anymore. i won't hear her laugh or see her give somebody a cute glare. her curly grey hair and wearing my grandfather's glasses to read. her flashiness and instance on class on the strangest of matters.
to know her now, you wouldn't call her warm and fuzzy, but she was. she was. she got stoney very slowly after the passing of pops, but if you caught her at the right moments, you would see it all melted away from time to time. small presents from people of things she really enjoyed, feeding my dog and swearing at her in italian (just like her mother did with her own dog), hand written letters, seeing people enjoying her cooking, helping her clean up...
she was also a very strong woman. lost her daughter to jaundice before they knew hoe to cure it. a mentally handicapped son in an era where they just lumped all the mental disabilities into one clump and tried to shove it all away. husband jailed and having to take care of two boys all alone while still trying to keep up appearances. a stubborn woman who ended up marrying the exact same man her brothers told her to go no where near and loving him even past his death. a lover of martinis made of nothing but vodka in a martini glass and a green olive to make it look like a drink a proper lady would have, and only in public. scratch of lottery tickets and made you swore to secrecy if you won one for her. fine dining chinese food. Elisabeth Taylor perfume. Beatrix Potter stories and art. Fabergé eggs and Hummel figurines. pride for everything her and her husband worked their lives for and the past few years watching it all decay with failing health and fiances plummeting.
the amount of memories i have of that house and of them are so numerous i can look at a photo of the room and see the memories move like images of a moving picture, transparent, and overlapping one another.
working in the garden. sunbathing in the garden. playing in the garden. feeding birds in the garden.
sitting on the front porch and carving pumpkins. sitting on the front porch and eating watermelons. sitting on the front porch and talking with the renter upstairs. sitting on the fort porch and playing games with my grandparents.
sitting at the kitchen table and every breakfast i had there as a child handmade by my grandfather with special care, love, and attention to details. every sunday dinner my grandmother made for us after he passed. she may have been surly but she insisted on us eating together and her making it. she insisted on family being together at least once a week for a meal.
sitting in the dining room for every holiday meal we had together. every easter, thanksgiving, and christmas that we were in driving distance or when my dad and brother moved upstairs. they all over lap each other. we always sat in the same spots and i can see each face transparent over the others in their various states and ages and emotional content.
and the living room. where i played quietly as a child with the doll that was meant for my aunt who passed as a child. playing with the coasters as if they were plates to a tea set. i know exactly where those coasters are now because they are always in the same spot.
always.
did you know when i was 19 i moved in with my grandmother for the summer so i could take care of her after one of her back surgeries? when she wasn't quit fit yet and needed help with house work. i worked at her brother's restaurant part time to have money to do things while in the city and to take grandma out sometimes. helped her get to and from doctor appoints on the bus and and she showed me how to cheat the system and get free bus and train rides and where the lost and found was at the restaurant. that woman was sly.
when she passes, the only stable things i've known in my short 33 years will go. she was the last bastion of stability in my life before steven. her, that house, and everything about that life will crumble apart and vanish. the memories won't but the actual reality based components of it will be.
that house was a monument. no, that house was a TEMPLE. a REFUGE. my grandparents were some sort of gods and keepers. when she passes, she will fade to whatever and where ever. hopefully with my grandfather and all those of her time that passed before her. but that house? that house is being sold due to a reverse mortgage she needed to take out to survive. it'll go to some one else. somebody who won't understand all the ghosts of my memories are constantly playing over each other. they might be swept away when they move in. sweeping away the stability i had in those moments, in those times. in those memories that will have no value to a newcomer. a new comer who will transform that temple into something else. not the meticulous eye and style of my grandparents who made everything look so amazing and worked hard to own all the amazing things they had.
i'm not just losing my grandmother, but i'm loosing the last strand of everything connected stable, constantly warm and loving childhood memories. i'm plenty full of unstable childhood memories. both warm and violent and scary that moved on whims and screamed and smashed walls and caught gentle breezes and laughter and giggles.
but it's the anchor of it all...
my grandmother is the last anchor of that life, and when she passes she's lifting it up and sailing away. taking it all with her. i'll gladly make that an offering to whatever may be out there, but i know it's going to leave such a gap in my life. i know the value of all of those memories, at least to me. right now. at this very moment. but there is no way i can comprehend the value of every one of them all at once. no human can. i will feel the value of them after they are gone and i will feel how much it hurts to remember them and THAT is the moment i will know their true value. right now, i just have an idea. a ballpark. and i know me. i'm human. i'm underselling it. those things show you their worth and it's something you could never even think of. never imagine. never know till you realize you can't have it again.
i love my grandmother. the strong, beautiful, stubborn woman. Lucille Rispoli D'Angelo.
right now she's preparing for her voyage. i will be crushed to know when she pulls up anchor even though i know she's going, but i also know where ever she's heading will treat her better than the struggle of the last few weeks, the last few months, the last few years.