Chicken Soup for the Grandma's Soul

  I’ve tuned in Nickelodeon and the Cartoon Network. I find it wonderful that despite all the changes in the world my grandchildren often watch the same cartoons and shows that I did years ago. We can watch Bugs Bunny or I Love Lucy together and laugh at all the same things. I thought I’d be bored at kids’ movies, but I’ve seen some truly original ones, like Babe and Toy Story and, of course, Shrek, while swiping a few handfuls of popcorn from my little compatriots.

  There is always a grandchild willing to go for ice cream or pizza, and the kids love to traipse through the little candy store nearby and pick out penny candy the same way I did when I was a kid. There is always someone to laugh (and as they get older, groan) at a corny joke. And any grandkid under the age of eight is happy to be my dance partner when I have old-time rock ’n’ roll blasting on the stereo in my living room.

  Just about everything, from making cupcakes to painting ceramics, is more fun when there’s a grandchild eager to learn how. All of sudden I’m an expert, despite my lack of skill in many such endeavors.

  Dr. Seuss wrote a wonderful book called Oh, the Places You’ll Go! and I’m grateful that I have grandchildren to take me along.

  Thanks, grandkids!

  Carolyn Mott Ford

  Will He Remember?

  What we learn with pleasure, we never forget.

  Alfred Mercier

  I have a confession to make. I am in love with a younger man.

  It is a deep and lasting love unlike any other I have experienced. When we are together, all is well with the world. When we are apart, I long for his presence to fill the ache in my heart. For over four years, his unconditional love has completed me like the last piece of a puzzle. I now understand when poets and romanticists describe how they would lay down their life for someone they love. I would do the same.

  The object of my affections is my only grandchild. I marvel at being a grandmother, but I wear it well, like a comfortable coat that feels right. I wonder why I do, since I have little experience of having a grandmother myself. My maternal grandmother died before I was born. My paternal grandmother lived in Europe, and I only recall her visiting us once. When I was about fifteen, my parents sent her a plane ticket to come to Canada for my sister’s wedding. She came, but the language differences made it difficult for us to communicate. I wondered what she felt when her son packed up his family and moved across the ocean so many years ago. I wished I had known her better. I wished she had come with us. I wished I had memories with her.

  I never knew what I missed until I became a grandmother myself. I can barely remember anything until I began school, and even then, they are only half-remembered fragments. My biggest concern is that my grandson will not remember our days together. Time is fleeting; it steals memories of yesteryear, evaporating with the dawn.

  Our days together, grandmother and grandson, are filled with fun, learning and play. Some days we just sip at the day, savoring it slowly, and other days we take a deep swallow and taste all it has to offer.

  With the consent of his parents, I have been fortunate to be part of many firsts in his young life. I was the first to take him to see Santa at the mall. I took him to his first movie, his first trip to the beach, his first haircut with “a real lady at a real hair-cutting place.” We have enjoyed lunches at restaurants, visits with friends and excursions to museums. We have ridden the bus and the train. We have scoured the neighborhood for garage sales, played in parks, fed the birds, splashed in puddles, raked leaves, picked pine cones and built snowmen. Will he remember any of this?

  I wonder if he will remember who taught him how to crack eggs and whisk batter nice and smooth for the pancakes he loves so much. Or how we built a secret fort under the dining room table with blankets. Will he remember who played endless games of Checkers, Candyland, and Chutes and Ladders with him, while teaching him how to lose gracefully? Will he recall who taught him to play “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” on the piano, his little fingers stretching to cover the right keys, his face a study in concentration?

  My grandson rejuvenates me. Seeing the world through his eyes is nothing short of wondrous. His energy is refreshing, and his infectious giggle makes me laugh. I pray he will remember the lullabies, the laughter and, most importantly, the love when he is grown and has a family of his own.

  Will he remember me?

  Maria Harden

  5

  THROUGH THE EYES OF

  I love these little people; and it is not a slight thing, when they, who are so fresh from God, love us.

  Charles Dickens

  Love Never to Be Blinded

  The balls of sight are so formed, that one man’s eyes are spectacles to another, to read his heart.

  Samuel Johnson

  “Mom! Come look at the sunset!” My six-year-old daughter called, running to the window at the retirement home. Mandy could be demanding and full of energy, and she seemed to be far more so when my attention was on someone else. Right now that attention was on my mother, frail and angry and sitting in the lobby of the retirement home we had placed her in.

  “It’s an institution! You’re trying to put me into an institution!” Mother had declared when we first suggested the idea. But with her age and her blindness and our trying to raise two very active girls and balance jobs to pay the bills, she finally relented. I had tried to make her happy and feel at home, even taking time to make her a lavender and blue quilt, her favorite colors before she lost her sight.

  So here she sat, huffy, gloomy and not talking to me. The caretaker of Suncrest Home came over with a cup of tea. “Now, Mrs. LeSage, how about a nice cup of tea? It’s your favorite, Earl Grey with lemon.”

  “Mom! Come see! Come see!” Mandy interrupted from the corner by the window.

  The caretaker smiled. Mother turned away and the tea was placed on the table beside her. I shrugged, not knowing what to do, how to cope anymore. I wasn’t far from tears.

  The caretaker pulled me gently aside. Away from the lobby and out in the corridor, she placed her arm around me as I collapsed into sobs. “I just don’t know what else to do,” I said, my voice breaking. “I know she hates me for it, but I don’t know what else I can do. She can’t be on her own, not with her blindness and . . .”

  “Quit blaming yourself,” she said firmly. “That won’t help either you or your mother. Right now you have to be firm but loving. In time, she will adjust to her new surroundings . . . and besides, you’re only a few miles away.”

  Not that it matters, I thought, remembering my mother’s stony glare and silent face. She would probably never talk to me again. I was walking back toward the lobby when I heard the excited voice of a child. Mandy! I had left her in there with her grandmother and the other residents! What could she be up to?

  “It is purple! Real, deep purple. Purple like the grapes on Uncle Willis’s vines in September!”

  “And what about the red? Is there any red?” an elderly voice asked.

  “Red? Yes there is red in it too! It has all different kinds of red—like the bike that Grandpa gave me for my birthday when I was five. Do you remember, Grandma?”

  I came in to see Mandy and her grandmother standing by the window as the warm sun set outside. Mandy gently pressed my mother’s hand to the glass. “I know you can’t see the red anymore, Grandma, but you can feel it, right? And the golden yellows and the orange and . . .”

  My mother smiled and clasped Mandy’s hand, then pulled her close for a hug. “Yes, I can. I can feel the colors of the sunset.”

  She let my daughter guide her back to a chair and hugged her once more. “And when you tell me what you see, well, it makes it all real for me.” She turned to me and said, “Well, now it’s your turn. Tell me, what color is that quilt that you made me on my bed?”

  From then on, Mandy met with her grandmother at least once a week and phoned her often. She told her of the colors of her school—brown wood and bright yellow paint with a picture of a happy face on the door. Sh
e told her of the green of the ocean when she first visited it and how the stormy blue sky was the same color as her cousin Jennifer’s eyes. She shared the dark black of her graduation gown and the glorious yellow rose corsage that Grandmother sent for her special day. She phoned her long distance to share the black sand of Hawaiian beaches and the icy crevices in the Yukon. She even told her the shade of hair of the boy she fell in love with—dark and wavy, just like the old pictures of Grandfather.

  Mandy taught me a valuable lesson: that I could not give my mother her sight back, or the life she once had. I had to stop feeling guilty and focusing on what I couldn’t give her but rather on what I could . . . time and the colorful sharing that comes from a love that is not blinded.

  Nancy V. Bennett

  Pennies from Heaven

  You cannot teach children to take care of themselves unless you let them try. They will make mistakes; and out of these mistakes comes wisdom.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  “Nana! Help! I’m falling!” and suddenly the little girl with her new roller blades had fallen on the sidewalk for the one hundredth time.

  “I can’t do it!” the little girl cried as a tear rolled down her cheek.

  “Don’t worry. I’m here to catch you,” whispered Nana as she wiped the tear away. “Remember, when it rains, it rains pennies from heaven!” Nana hugged the girl and started to hum the song.

  From the time the girl was six weeks old, Nana took care of her in every way. She fed, rocked and played with the girl. She never seemed to mind when the little girl smelled dirty. She was always there with open arms when the little girl was wobbly or unsure of herself. She smiled and encouraged her when the little girl couldn’t talk well and told her to keep practicing.

  “You can do anything you want to do. Just put your mind to it,” Nana would say to her.

  Nana taught the little girl to play the piano. In Nana’s shaky handwriting, she would write songs for the little girl to play on the piano. Every Christmas they saw The Nutcracker together. Nana would cheer and clap when the little girl would try to twirl and dance like the ballerinas.

  “Remember, never give up. Just feel the music in here,” and she would point to her heart. The little girl understood, because when she was with Nana she felt she could be and do almost anything.

  During this time the little girl didn’t notice how Nana’s hands and head shook for no reason at all. She didn’t notice, and she didn’t care. Nana loved her and was her very best friend.

  Soon the little girl went off to school. She got new friends and became busy with all the things school brings. She had less and less time to spend with Nana. Nana’s shaking got much worse, and soon the girl felt strange being with her. The little girl found out that Nana had a disease called Parkinson’s, which is a disease that takes over a person’s body. This disease forced Nana to move to a nursing home to be taken care of.

  One day the girl went to visit Nana. Everything about the nursing home gave the girl a strange and uncomfortable feeling. She noticed the small, bare room. She noticed that Nana didn’t smell as good as she used to. The girl heard Nana’s teacup make a clinking noise against the plate as her Nana slowly took a sip. The girl could hardly watch as Nana got up and slowly, oh so slowly, tried to take a tiny step. The girl felt sad as she watched her Nana fall back on her bed. And then suddenly the girl saw a picture in her mind.

  The girl remembered how Nana had gently encouraged her when she was learning how to try her new roller blades. She remembered how Nana would hug her and smile whenever the girl felt she couldn’t do something. And then she realized something else Nana had given her. Nana had taught her what to do for someone who needed to feel safe, secure and loved.

  The girl took her Nana by the hand and slowly helped her to her feet.

  “Well, I can’t walk as good as I used to. I don’t feel so sure of myself,” Nana slurred.

  “Don’t worry, Nana, you can do it. You know, when it rains, it rains pennies from heaven.”

  Emily Erickson

  Ten years old

  Dusting in Heaven

  Heaven, the treasury of everlasting joy.

  William Shakespeare

  My eight-year-old son, Jonathan, is an exceptionally inquisitive and cheerful child who must have an answer for every question that enters his mind. I truly admire this awe-inspiring quality in him. However, I’m stumped when I do not have an answer for him.

  While tucking him into bed one night I faced the hardest question he’d posed to me up until then.

  “Mommy,” he said, “where is my granny now, and what is she doing there?”

  I was entirely lost for words. There was a long pause as I searched my heart and soul for an appropriate answer.

  My mother-in-law had been diagnosed with lymphoma and suffered through two long years of chemotherapy and radiation. Our family, being very close, prayed together as we watched this horrible disease claim her life twenty-six months later. My son was very close to his grandmother, and her death was a great mystery to him. I always knew this time would come, but how to prepare for such a question was a mystery to me.

  Granny must have been listening to the conversation between her only grandson and me because my answer to him came out as if someone was talking for me.

  “Jonathan,” I began, “Granny has gone to live in heaven.” Recalling the special care and tidiness she took with her home, I added, “She is dusting the clouds and keeping them shiny white.”

  After a brief thought, Jonathan smiled as if he could imagine Granny working hard in heaven, and he kissed me good night. Relieved that I had satisfied his curiosity, I let out a breath of relief. I, too, missed her, and was happy I had moved through the interrogation without tears. Jonathan fell asleep, happily as always.

  The next morning he ran through the house and jumped into bed with me. “Mom!” he said, “please come and look out your window!”

  I half opened my eyes and gazed at the rays of sunshine filtering into my bedroom. “Yes, Jonathan, it is going to be a beautiful day.”

  Jonathan had a glow about him as he looked at me with his wide-open eyes. His face beamed like a shaft of light as he glared out the window where the sun came shining in. He said, “Granny is doing a great job up there in heaven. Just look at those clean, white, fluffy clouds!”

  Denise Peebles

  Healing

  You must do the thing you think you cannot do.

  Eleanor Roosevelt

  Grieving deeply, Grandma Dunkle refused to sleep in her bedroom after Grandpa died. To everyone’s surprise, her four-year-old granddaughter, Robbi, adopted the mission of reacquainting Grandma with her king-sized bed again.

  “Grandma, we sleep in your bed tonight,” Robbi would say.

  “No,” Grandma replied, her eyes filling with tears. “Not tonight.”

  And so it went, one weekend trailing after another during sleepovers, with Robbi’s plea rejected time and again.

  One night, after changing into their pajamas, Robbi simply led her grandmother by the hand down the hallway to the master bedroom. Grandma paused in the doorway for a long while, tears welling up. Robbi jumped onto the bed and flipped back the covers.

  “It’s all right, Grandma,” she said, patting the space next to her.

  Like swallowing medicine whole to avoid the bitter taste, her grandmother quickly scooted under the covers. There, they held each other snug in the middle of the huge bed, where for the first time in weeks her grandmother slept without nightmares.

  Through the wisdom and sensitivity of a child, a grandmother had taken the first tentative step toward a healing journey.

  Once again, as a teenager, Robbi perched on the edge of the king-sized bed, caressing her grandmother’s hand. There were only a few months left. Robbi tended to her in those few precious months, massaging her with a wealth of love and tenderness. Studies and boys and other high school commitments were relegated to the back burner.

  A
nd for the second time in her life, Robbi’s heart broke when her beloved grandmother was laid to rest.

  But it didn’t stop there.

  As a young woman, Robbi, continues to make everwidening ripples within the older, more fragile generation. One can see her today as a college student working in a nursing home, changing a feeding tube, cupping an elderly resident’s hand while he reminisces, reading letters for eyes that can no longer focus.

  And to think it all began with a four-year-old rising above her own grief to reach out and heal her grandmother.

  Jennifer Oliver

  I Will Remember

  If becoming a grandmother was only a matter of choice, I should advise every one of you straight away to become one. There is no fun for old people like it!

  Hannah Whithall Smith

  Until I was eight I thought Sunday was called Sunday because you had to spend it in the sun. I thought that because I spent every single Sunday outside in the garden with Nana. The zucchini plants quickly became my favorite. It was the way the tiny little delicate tendrils reached out and wrapped around the lattice, like tiny fingers holding on as tightly as they could. They seemed so helpless. I would sit on the ground and tend to them, sensing that they needed me. Nana would sit there, perched on her gardening stool, looking at the tomatoes in the same way.

  “Nana,” I asked one day, “should I take off all these little yellow flowers?”

  “Why would you take the flowers off?” she asked gently.

  “Well, I thought they might attract the bugs and then the bugs might eat them.”

  “No, darling,” she said with a little laugh, “those flowers will turn into zucchini soon.”

  “Really?”

  “You just wait. Soon you’ll see that little things can turn into wonderful things. You should remember that.”