My grandma, GrammaMona, passed away this morning at her home.  She had been battling cancer for a couple of years.  Some people are so lucky, and I am one of them.  Over the past month I have been writing bits of her story to hopefully share with a wider audience.  GrammaMona thought I could have chosen a better subject, and snickered a bit when I told her I was compiling her stories.

Molly, GrammaMona and me.

She obliged nevertheless.  Grandmas are famous for caving to the whims of their grandchildren, even when they are in their mid-thirties.  I know that she is human and has her share of flaws, but I could never find many.  If God is love, as the Bible states, then I’ve known no one else to be more like God.

Below is a bit of a snapshot of my grandmother, that I’ve been working on for the last month or so.  (It begins in the middle of a thought and only partially concludes as it is part of much larger work…)

“…Being the eldest of her grandchildren I gave her the moniker “GrammaMona,” though the rest of the world referred to her as Ramona.  As the words of eldest grandchildren often do, this is the name that lasted, and one I believe that she has enjoyed.  It earned me the accidental nickname Keith.  (Keith is my uncle, this is described earlier in an unpublished portion of the story)

At some point during our younger years I suppose we all are annoyed by the confusion of the aging mind.  We somehow believe that we will be the kind of person who is granted marvelous clarity as we age.  I only minded being called Keith for a period of about 3 years in my mid teens.  During my 3 year mild-resentment to being referenced as “Keith…er…Ryan” I recall a time or two when I noted to her my brilliant individuality.

As these irritations do, it passed with time.  I got used to it.  Then I kind of thought it was funny, and finally I liked it.  Eventually, when she wouldn’t catch herself, forgetting to scroll through the list, leaving me as “Keith,” I stopped caring all together.  I began to understand that my grandma’s name confusion was simply a reminder of my high-ranking in her heart.  Years later, upon the birth of my third child, I realized that the accidental listing of names comes quite honestly.

Now whenever I laugh or bark commands or get angry or express my love, my eldest son is always named first regardless of who it might be that I am addressing at that moment.  Even though I have yet to turn 40, my mind is slipping away at a glacier’s pace.  I notice it most acutely when I am expressing some great emotion.  The people I accidentally address are the ones I love most; who live more richly within my own heart than in their reality.

That is how my grandma thinks of me.  Knowing this brings a sense of calm to even the darkest hours of my spirit.  It is a familiar feeling, an old one I have always known.  When you always know something, you rarely take notice of it in real-time.  To have always known a love that can reach deep within your soul is a blessing beyond measure, and yet, like having a foot at the end of your leg, or a moist tongue behind your teeth, you rarely consider what life might be like without it.

It is this sort of knowledge that humankind was created to believe in.  The hope of attaining that knowledge is frequently sold to acquire some thing cheaper and more tangible.  Once this hope becomes a commodity life loses a little meaning, unless one realizes their own desperation for the thing they just traded away, and searches to regain that fleeting glimmer of a promise.

I am speaking only of the hope of knowing great and loyal love; not of that love itself.  Even the hope of discovery is powerful.  For if you have experienced or lived in the reality of that kind of piercing, life-altering love, you cannot sell it or trade it.  It is more valuable than any possession or title or greatness to which one could aspire.  A man would sooner live without a roof than without the depth of meaning that this love offers.

It is in the context of this love that the grand questions, the meaning of life and its God are, if not answered, at least rendered less severe.  It is a glimpse of that Being, and a purpose larger than one’s calling or station.  It is an understanding that is unteachable.  But if you have ever known this kind of love, it must be extended and shared…”

Miss you already; and thank you.