RE: The Stories She Gave Me: On books and the death of my grandmother
This brought tears to my eyes. All my grandparents have passed by the time I was 17; three of them had already passed by the time I was 12. Reading posts like this makes me feel weird. On the one hand, I can feel the connection you had with your grandmother, and how she impacted who you are today. At the same time, I get the blues, as I never really had a deep connection with any of my grandparents. The last grandmother I had, she had 8 children and 30 grand-children. Her house was always busy. I met my cousins there frequently, but never really developed a deep connection with her. And then she was quite sick for the last 2 or 3 years of her life. Seeing me, she would think that I'm one of her sons (my uncle).
However, as you said, I can connect with her through what my mother's experiences. She was a great mother to my mother, and I can see that in the way my mother raised me. It's quite indirect, but her impact is there. Thank you for this post. Weird fuzzy feelings...
I hear those weird fuzzies. Sometimes it's the legacy or the myth we miss. Stories spanning generations. It sounds like your last grandmother was a family hub who connected you with your extended family. You could frame that as your relationship with her. That sickness . . . my grandmother died of Alzheimer's. I know the feeling of being mistaken quite well.
Yeah, she definitely was a family hub. We used to meet almost every week (Malta is small, so we live relatively close). Ever since she had gotten really sick, we stopped meeting; it's a shame.
Alzheimer's sucks. You want to make the best out of the last days, but you really can't. I remember my mother did not want us to see my grandmother in her last year so that we keep remembering her to how she used to be before.