There are so many things about my Grandmother that I remember well from my short trips to visit her each summer.
But few stick with me and come to mind often.
She used to tell me…. “There is no such thing as an ugly young person.”
It was her way of telling me to appreciate my youth and don’t take it for granted.
She also used to tell me, upon seeing the way my generation danced … “You all dance like wild animals. It’s wonderful.”
She was a happy, bubbly polish woman who wore a kerchief and spent 95% of the time in the kitchen. And adored feeding her gigantic family. Her hands were huge from milking cows. My dad has her exact hands. They dwarf others.
I got to spend several days in the Turtle Mountains, to celebrate one of her granddaughter’s wedding. They were married overlooking the hills. The cows below. She was one of the little grandkids… and now she is not so little anymore.
I danced like a wild heathen for a while and drank wine and ate bleeding armadillo cake (the groom was from Texas and claimed “Ya’ll have BIG skitos up here!!”
My trips as adult aren’t the same.
I don’t get to sleep in a room next to my grandma, or sit with my grandpa at night and eat cereal, or wake up to the smell of bacon, or run rampant with the chickens. Or listen to her chuckle. Or see the adoration in her eyes she had for every single grandchild she had. Not anymore.
But I get to sit peacefully in the hills. Next to the lakes. And breathe.
That’s all I really need.
