An Open Letter to My Grandma

To my dearest Grandma in Heaven:

It has been three whole years.  Can you believe it?  Because I can’t.

I feel like it was just yesterday that you were still alive.  I feel like we were just in your car on the way to the park, making a pit stop to eat McDonald’s breakfast together.  The hotcakes were (and still are) my favorite.

I feel like it was just yesterday that we drove from Latrobe to Indiana to visit Kelly.  I feel like you just introduced me to my twin cousin Jessica.  Don’t worry, I do stay in touch with both of them.

I feel like it was just yesterday that we were sitting in the church pews together with you holding my hand.  You always had Winterfresh gum for me because I was always hungry before the church service was over.  I feel like it was just yesterday when I would fall asleep on your lap in the church pews.  And after church, we’d always go to Shop N’ Save to get foot-long hot dogs for lunch.

It feels like just yesterday that we were making homemade ham pot pie together in the kitchen.  You always let me help with the dough noodles.  That was (and still is) my favorite part.

I feel like I was just participating in the 4th of July Parade for the church with you and pappy watching proudly from the crowd.  Mom and dad have the picture you took with the polaroid hanging up on their fridge.

Weren’t we just on the way to Ohio to meet my cousin who I never knew I had?  Or wasn’t I just sitting in the backseat singing along to Christian songs with you on my way to Vacation Bible School?

Wasn’t it just yesterday when we watched game shows together in the living room, and always talked about how someday we’d go on The Price is Right or Wheel of Fortune as a duo?  The Price is Right toured near Harrisburg and Kyle and I were going to go, but it wasn’t going to be the same since you weren’t with me.

Wasn’t it just yesterday when you taught me how to play a form of Gin Rummy, and I was asking you to play anytime we weren’t doing anything?  And those time when you played with Uncle Bum and Aunt Carrie and never let me play with the grown-ups so I was forced to watch The Sandlot in the living room for the millionth time?  Trust me, I have no complaints because The Sandlot is still one of my all-time favorites.

Wasn’t it just yesterday that we went to Idlewild Park, where we took train rides through Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood?  Or when we rode the Tilt-A-Whirl together and I was mystified about how gravity forces you against the ride?

Wasn’t it just yesterday when you encouraged me to play basketball with your neighbor’s son or when you asked the neighbor if I could ride her horses?  I have a picture of those somewhere but they’re probably still in WV.

Wasn’t it just yesterday when we would play Bingo together, I won $500, and you would tease me about marrying the kid who brought me my french fries?

And yet, none of that happened yesterday.  I’m not a child anymore.  And you left this Earth to be with pappy, Uncle Rick and Angie three years ago today.

Just over three years ago was the last time that I talked to you, that I gave you a hug, that I held your hand, that I brought you flowers for your birthday.  I didn’t know at that time that that would be the last time I ever saw you.  

You were so concerned about me having to drive all the way back to Harrisburg by myself, when in reality there was nowhere else I would have rather been.  I knew you weren’t feeling one hundred percent, and I knew it had been quite some time since you felt that well.  I knew that the one place I had to be at that moment was by your side.

I didn’t know at that time about the dreams you were having, where you saw pappy and Uncle Rick again.  I didn’t know that only a few days later, you’d be lying in a hospital bed with tubes and machines surrounding you.  I didn’t know that I’d be driving out to Latrobe on Good Friday to say my goodbyes.  I didn’t know that I’d be the one to have to tell you that it was OK for you to go- that even though we needed you here on Earth, pappy, Uncle Rick, and Angie needed you more.  I had to tell you that even though we would be in pain because we missed you, that we would get through it together.

I went to the church after leaving the hospital to pray for you.  Pastor Ralph’s wife magically recognized me after not seeing me for at least 15 years.  I had been pacing around the church for at least ten minutes until they saw me.  The doors of the church were locked, but they let me in to pray for you.  Pastor Ralph stayed and prayed with me and held my hand at the same altar where I’d go up with pappy as a kid to pray.

Mom and I ate McDonald’s breakfast on the morning of your funeral at the top of the parking garage that I thought was so cool when I was younger- the same one you and pappy always drove me to after getting McDonald’s.  It was a cloudy morning and rain was in the forecast, but while we were at the top of the parking garage, the sun broke through.  Mom and I knew you were there.

I know you’ll never physically see this letter, but I hope and pray you somehow know it exists.  I need you to know how much I love and miss you.  I need you to know how sorry I am that I wasn’t around more often as I grew older.  I stopped coming up for the summers when I became a teenager, and even though I enjoyed those summers with my friends, I wish we could’ve spent more time together.

I long for one more card game, one more conversation, one more hug, one more laugh, one more adventure at Bingo, one more church service, one more smile.  However, I know these wishes aren’t feasible, at least not anytime in the near future.

So today I write to you in hopes that you’re proud of me.  In the years that you’ve been gone, I got engaged (to Kyle- I hope you remember him), we moved into two different apartments and just recently a house, Kyle and I got married, I started another new job, I received a few promotions/raises, we adopted a cute little pup named Oakley and I leased my first car.

Kyle is doing really well for himself, too.  He has a reliable car and a good job that he loves.  For only being 25, we’re both doing really well for ourselves.

Whenever I think of love, I think of you and pappy.  You were married for 60 years before pappy passed away.  I knew that whenever I said yes to Kyle’s proposal, we would have a love like yours and pappy’s.  I want you to know that I’m so truly happy, but I wish that you could have been at our wedding, to see our house, and to meet our puppy.

I’m sorry I don’t get to visit your last Earthly resting place as much as I’d like to.  But I did bury those bright blue flowers with you.  They survived through your funeral, which I never thought would happen in a million years.  They looked just as fresh as the day that I bought them for you.  I hope you liked them as much as I did.

And this is where I leave you.  It took me days to write this letter, years to even have the strength to write it to you.  So I’ll leave you with this- I love you so much, grandma.  I miss you dearly.  I hope I’ve made you proud.  Rest peacefully.

Love,

Emily

Starting a New Chapter

The trouble is, you think you have time.” – Buddha

A few weeks ago on a lonely Friday night I spent by myself in mine and my fiance’s apartment (readers-we have a lot of catching up to do!), I was suddenly inspired to start writing on this blog again and telling the story of what happened to my grandma.  Only a few days ago did I realize that it’s not necessarily what happened to her that matters with regard to my lack of writing (nor is it anything that you necessarily want to hear- there were some pretty gruesome aspects); it’s what she meant to me and how that turned into inspiration for writing.

My grandma passed away on April 4, 2015.  If you look at when my last post was published, it was only a week or so prior to that date, and in short that explains my lack of writing, and I do apologize for my absence since that time.

At that time, I was temporarily staying with my fiance’s (at this time he was still my boyfriend) Aunt and his grandma (which is a long story in itself of how we got to living there), and it was so nice because it felt like even if I wasn’t around my grandma as much as I would like, I still had Grandma Vera to help me along, although she wasn’t in the best of conditions, either.  It was so nice to have a grandma figure around, who could give wise advice and tell stories of when she was young.

We had been living there for less than two months when I got the phone call late Saturday night that awoke me from my place on the couch.  The world was suddenly less beautiful when I realized my Grandma was no longer around.  If I had been by myself at that time that I got the call, I don’t know what I would have done, and I am so so thankful that Daria and Grandma Vera were in the house (and shortly thereafter, Kyle).  My grandma was my world, and it kills me that she might not have known that.  Not only was she my world, but she was my inspiration.

I remember visiting her in the hospital with my aunt and uncle and even my Sunday School teacher from when I went to church with my grandparents twice a week during my summers growing up.  I had woken up early that Friday morning and drove three and a half hours just to see her, and even if I didn’t want to admit it at that time, I knew it would be the last time I’d see her in her body on this Earth.  After spending a few hours there, my aunt and uncle left the room so I could say everything that I wanted and needed to at that moment- just between the two of us.

I remember seeing her with a breathing tube from her mouth and her muscles twitching, but I knew she wasn’t there, and I knew she hadn’t been in her body for a few days.  I remember holding her hand and wishing she would just open her eyes, just like she did the Sunday prior when I woke her up from her nap on her notorious recliner.  But I knew this time she wasn’t going to open her eyes, no matter how much I wished for that to happen.

I remember saying how much I loved her, how much I needed her here, and how much everyone else needed her, especially my mom who was still heartbroken after losing both my uncle and my grandpa so close together.

People have often told me that I was her favorite, even out of her own children.  I spent every summer with her and my grandpa and she and I would always go to bingo, get our hair done together, go to the mall, go to the park, etc.  You name it, we probably did it.  With us being so close, everyone secretly hoped that once I came into the room and said hello and told her I missed her and loved her and needed her, she would open her eyes.  A part of me feels like I let them down when that didn’t happen.  But I think the reason she didn’t open her eyes again was because of what I had to tell her- the one thing she needed to hear, and how she needed to hear it from me.  At first I joked with her and told her she couldn’t leave until I started working for a newspaper in Pittsburgh so I could get her inside the Steelers locker room.  That had always been the joke between us- but I had every intention on making it happen.

But then I did the bravest thing I think I’ve ever done thus far in my lifetime.  While I stood there beside her, holding her clammy hand with one hand and pushing her matted hair back with my other, I said the one thing that needed to be said; the one thing that I think she needed to hear.  I told her I was selfish for wanting her to stay, because she wasn’t really living.  I told her that she was in so much pain, and she would continue to be for as long as she held on.  Then I told her that my Pappy, her sweetheart who she had been married to for sixty wonderful years, needed her too, probably more than we needed her here.  And that my uncle Rick, one of the sweetest and kindest men to walk this Earth, the youngest of her children, needed his mom.

The truth is, my grandma started going downhill when she lost her baby- my uncle was only 50 when he passed.  My grandpa passed in October of 2013, about a year and half after my uncle, and my grandma continuously started getting worse.  I never really knew how bad she had gotten until a few days ago when I looked back at my Facebook messages between my mom, my siblings and me and I saw that she was in and out of the hospital an outrageous amount over the last year she was alive.  It was clear to me then that she hadn’t really been living for quite some time- simply going through life day by day, always in pain and her heart always aching.  I know now that she is in the best place she can be.

The past few months that I’ve been silent, I’ve been grieving.  After she passed (and a week after, sweet Grandma Vera passed as well), I just couldn’t find the words to write.  Everything was so overwhelming and it felt like I had no time to process it.  In those two weeks, I lost all of my inspiration, because one of the few people who kept me inspired had left this Earth.

I may still be sad that my best friend isn’t here anymore, but I knew she would want me to stop being so sad and work toward fulfilling my dreams.  I hope to do that with her help even though she isn’t here anymore.  My Grandma was always my number one fan when it came to writing (and being a journalist in general), and even though I know she was proud of me, I hope to make her even more proud by following my dreams.  Not only am I going to use this inspiration to write random thoughts about every day life on this blog (and hopefully create a career out of blogging/writing); I’m also going to use her inspiration to create a story in her, Grandma Vera’s, and my Grandma King’s memory.  Whether it takes me five, ten or twenty years to finish, I promise there will be a novel in bookstores across the country that on the very first page leaves a dedication to my Grandma Haase, Grandma Vera, and my sweet sweet Grandma King who passed years ago but that I don’t go a day without thinking about, either.

So here’s to starting a new chapter, here’s to doing what I love most without holding myself back any longer, and here’s to the women who have been/will be my biggest inspirations.