I always find myself a little melancholy on this day. I could completely forget it was the fifth, but I would still wake up on this day just feeling out of place; just slightly left of center, not quite normal. 14 years ago, it was a Sunday. Friends of mom's, from church, had dropped us off and we received some of the worst news I've heard in my young life.
I'm re-posting a story from Creative Non-Fiction class back in 2004. When I wrote it, I was trying to capture how it felt during that time and a little bit after. I think about my grandmother's death every year on the anniversary, but it's not something that bothers me as it once did. I have come to terms with the events of that weekend and what it has meant in my life. I say this because a note from my professor, when I turned in the story, suggested that I talk to a counselor at school if these things were still a problem. I was taken aback when she said it 1)because it was a story somewhat based in reality but amped up, but not indicative of my, then, current feelings on the matter and 2) it was the first time anyone had suggested it to me. No one had thought about it when I was going through the grieving and subsequent bullshit and I just didn't realize it was something people did. Go to counseling because you can't deal with something? Only normal people do that.
It's weird to read through it now. My writing style feels completely different to me. It's almost like someone else wrote it. It sounds very young to me and the transitions from topic to topic feel disjointed. I remember that when I wrote it I tried to imagine delivering it as a monologue, so that probably accounts for some of it. If I wrote it today, it would be completely different. It would be a little more positive, I think, more nostalgic. I remember thinking it was one of the better things I'd written and that's part of the reason I was going to re-post it here. But reading it now, I don't think that's true. Or if it is one of the better things I've written, I give myself too much credit on more recent things I've written. Still I'll re-post, give me something to reflect on in about ten years or so. We'll see how much my writing style has changed by then.
Anyway, here it is, pretty much unedited, though ,so be nice in the comments, if you leave any.
My grandmother’s death was very unexpected. The entire family was surprised, though we shouldn’t have been. We should have known. We should have known every time we walked into her house, when we were greeted by a wall of cigarette smoke. Every time she would say, “ I am so sick with my head,” we should have known. Her breakfast of coffee and Excedrin, everyday, should have been an indication, but we were still surprised. Even if some of us had heeded the warning of her cough, she never did. Even if we had heeded the warning it would pass from memory soon after.
She was everything to the family, everything. Of course she would never allow her self to become anything less than the very center, the heart, of the family. She was the cause and the comfort in almost every family conflict. All of the adults in the family had suffered her wrath at one point or another. She had her set opinions and guidelines for everyone’s life. Any alteration from these specifications was justification for reprimand.
When my aunt was younger, she would sneak out of her room to meet with the neighbor kids. One night, when my grandmother finally caught her, my grandmother asked her, “ When are you gonna quit acting like a gyp-dog in heat?” My grandmother was never at a loss for words or clever turn of phrase. She would exact her revenge quickly and often when least expected. When my father finally came out of the closet to me and my sister, my grandmother used her spare key to let herself into the apartment one day while everyone was gone. That day she emptied my father’s home of all the things she had ever given him. His grandmother’s plate, with the colonial couple painted on it, was removed from its hanger on the wall and given to my aunt. My father came home that weekend to find his walls bare, save the hanging fixtures. He says that was one of his most depressing days.
I forget how my father found his way back into her good graces. Undoubtedly, my aunt had done something to fall from favor momentarily. They were always on this teeter-totter of approval. I cannot remember a time when they were both on my grandmother’s good side, but there are plenty of occasions where they were both banished. Then, my father and aunt would be friends and not rivals. These times, however, did not last long as they were always seeking my grandmother’s approval.
I was not made aware of these antics until much later in my young life. Thanksgiving was always my favorite time. We had a tradition of hiding a rubber cockroach in someone’s plate. When I think about it now it seems really gross, but at the time it was so much fun. When I look back at the videos of thanksgivings past I can see the struggle between the adults. It’s not very pronounced, but whichever family member was out of favor usually received the cockroach. It was not until my seventeenth year that I realized what it meant to be an adult. She’d always been the perfect grandmother. Watching me and my sister, while my parents worked. My grandmother was always on this pedestal for me. In the summer time she would make ham sandwiches for me and my sister, making sure to cut the crusts off and layering the ham the way our parents never would. She made the best chicken noodle casserole, and all of my memories of her are positive. Save one, save one.
It was October of my junior year in high school, early October. My mother had fallen on some ice earlier in the year and was still using a walker to walk. She wasn’t driving and we relied on friends and relatives to transport us to and fro. My grandmother had stopped by my mother’s apartment earlier that day to invite us up for the afternoon. Of course, we accepted. Mom wanted to watch some Christian Men’s rally on TV with my grandmother. That had been a big topic of discussion at church since a group of our "Christian brothers" were planning to go. I had stopped going to church when my Sunday school teacher told me my father was going to hell. My father was a fine Christian and I saw no reason why he should be condemned to an eternity of suffering when he had enough of it on Earth. My decision to support my father in his lifestyle did not bode well with my grandmother, but she had yet to tell me her opinion.
I remember it was a Saturday afternoon and we’d picked up a pizza from Pizza Hut. Everyone else had finished eating and I sat at the table eating the last slice of cheese pizza. My grandmother was in her usual Pink chair with her gnarled feet resting on the matching ottoman. There was a cigarette dangling from her fingertips. She and my mother were discussing the rally, the fine moral characters of the men at the rally. Then, for some reason I can’t remember, I said, “Mommom, Can’t you see that these men are closed-minded hate mongers?” These were the exact words my father had used when he talked about the Christian rally.
She looked directly at me, flicked her cigarette ash in the ash tray beside her chair, and said,” You’re just repeating what your father told you. You couldn’t possibly think that’s true.”
“I do,” I told her, and I really did believe that at the time. I told her that they wouldn’t allow minorities to attend the rally and that was wrong.
Again, she flicked her cigarette. Then she exchanged a glance with my mother and then immediately back to me. I felt like I was under scrutiny by some meticulous drill sergeant. “You’ve changed, Becky, and not for the better.” She then turned her attention back to the TV , but her words resounded in my ears like an echo in a hollow cave.
The judgement doesn’t sound so severe when written down, but it still echoes in my heart today. You’ve changed, Becky, and not for the better. She said little else to me that day and when she called Sunday afternoon she only spoke with my sister about the Orioles score. Mom’s newly married friends were driving us back to our father’s house that evening and I resented her for it. I barely new these people and did not want to spend the better part of an hour in their smelly car. Unfortunately, I had no choice in the matter and was locked in their car. My sister said, “Goodbye,” to my grandmother, hung up the phone and joined me in our prison for the next hour. I wish that I had know what was to happen and I would never had left.
When we finally reached my father’s house, I noticed that only Jim’s car was in the driveway. This meant that my father wasn’t home, only his domestic partner. Jim was waiting for us. “Your father went to your grandmother’s. He tried to wait for you, but had to go. I don’t know the best way to tell you this. Your grandmother is in the hospital.”
My mind was flooded with a million questions but there were no answers until my father called a few minutes later. He was crying, and I have very few memories of my father crying. She had had an aneurysm. Apparently when she had gotten off the phone with my sister, she had gotten up to go to the bathroom. On her way there, she collapsed. The paramedics say she was dead before she hit the floor. If that was supposed to make me feel better, it didn’t. We were surprised, but we shouldn’t have been.
And every night before I go to sleep I hear those words. You’ve changed, Becky, and not for the better. You’ve changed, Becky, and not for the better. I hear those words and I hear her saying them, and I cry in to my pillow so I won’t wake my sister. I cry silent tears every day and wish that I could go back. At the funeral, everyone thought it was great that each family member had gotten to spend time with her before she died. I agree, but they don’t know the words that are rumbling around inside my head and beating in my heart. You’ve changed, Becky, and not for the better. I wish I hadn’t fought with her that Saturday. I wish I had talked to her on the phone that Sunday, then I could remember her saying something else. I wish a million different things about that weekend, but it’s not reality. I didn’t know, and I was surprised.
