Random, Profound Thoughts

It is 7:16am.

I must needs hie me to a restroom.

It is an unfortunate (awesome) byproduct of being an English teacher that I sometimes think in Shakespeare-talk.

I have a student that just drives me nuts. He is a meanie. I have decided, should I ever need to refer to this student on my blog, I will use the code-name, "Bromulous." He gets my goose.

It is an unfortunate (awesome) byproduct of living with Grandpa for two years that I sometimes think in Grandpa-talk.

"Hoooooly To-LE-do!"

Speaking of Grandpa, he had a blind date. When Grandpa considers women, he has two qualifications: 1.) That she be a democrat, and 2.) That she is in relatively good health.

We young whipper-snappers may look for an attractive appearance, decent education, a sense of humor, etc. With Grandpa: it's health. He just wants to know that a lady friend won't collapse when they're out to dinner.

In any case, the blind date did not fruitify. He had a blast with her, but at the end, the lady told him that she was already seriously dating someone else. What the h***! Old lady played my Grandpa?! Oh you SIT DOWN, beeatch!!

I work at a Christian school. I do not use words like beeatch.

I am very proper.

Actually, it is one of my favorite things to explain the dirty jokes in Shakespeare to my students. Also, yesterday, I told my seniors the story of why Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI didn't consummate their marriage for so long which was basically: because they couldn't figure out how to "do it." They literally didn't know how, for years. The seniors were thoroughly titillated by that story.

Earlier in the year, I accidentally used the word "fugly." I thought it was a combination of "funky" and "ugly." It is a combination of a different word with "ugly." My seniors have yet to let me forget it. Especially since the subject of my description was Jesus.

Lord forgive me.

My AP kids are going to come in in 15 minutes. I lost half of their timed writes. I am hideously irresponsible.

Today is Friday. I have a three day weekend. God speed, 2:45pm.

Seven Decades for Several Dates...

For Christmas, Grandpa bought four tickets to Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, which is the current broadway show in town, and without question one of my favorite musicals all throughout growing up. Originally, it was supposed to be a girls' night out, the tickets going to my mom, my aunt, my sister, and I. However, Seattle's "Arctic Blast" has literally snowed everyone in, and Mom and Heidi decided there was no way they were going to make the 200+ mile trip to Seattle when things like this were happening. So, at the last minute, Grandpa decided to call up two of his friends to use the remaining tickets.

Which meant that last night, I went out to dinner and a Broadway show with three very elderly dates.

Gramps, Bill, and Jane are all intelligent, charming, and funny-- but there were several moments where I couldn't help but notice the 50+ year age difference...

Honorable Mention Old People Moment:
(When waiting for the valet to bring around our car.)
Bill: I used to shag cars when I was a college student.
Greta: Did you make pretty good tips?
Bill: Oh yes. We would make... 15 to 20 dollars a night. Which back then... (grins proudly)... was doin' alright.

Third Best Old People Moment:
Grandpa: "Bill, you're a very fine looking gentleman."
Bill: "What?"
Grandpa: "I'm telling you, you're a very handsome gentleman."
Bill: "What?"
Jane: "He has trouble hearing."
Grandpa: "Can you hear me Bill?"
Bill: "I just heard part of it."
Jane: "Probably all he needs to hear."

Second Best Old People Moment:
Bill: "THIS snowstorm is bad, but I've seen worse. Craig, were you in Seattle during January of... 1950?"

And, from last night, my favorite:
Best Old People Moment:
Bill: Did you know, I'm taking fifteen pills a day now? Fifteen!
Grandpa: Well, Jane's been ahead of you there for some time now, haven't you Jane?
Jane: Oh yes. I'm still ahead of him.
Grandpa: (With a victorious glint in his eye.) I only take six.

Haha! The rest of the time, I just basked in the wisdom. And tried to say, "Grandpa" loudly enough to avoid being thought of by strangers as Gramps' trophy wife!

The Man in My Life

Grandpa woke me up this morning with a holler. "School is CANCELLED!!"
"Woo hoo!" I cried sleepily, and fell back asleep.

I got up at 8:30. The world outside was dreamy and still and covered in snow. My view down to the lake was obscured by a hushed gray wash. "I think you're snowed in today, sweetheart!" Gramps called. Yet he was bustling, putting on shoes and a jacket.
"Where are you going?" I asked.
"I have my haircut," he said.
"Gramps... Can't you reschedule? Our driveway's totally covered."
"Oh no, I've got to go!" he said, determined. "She made it in to work for me, so I've got to go! I'll just clear the driveway."

So we did, together: him with a wide broom, and me with a wide dust-bin, industriously clearing in my pajamas, snow boots, and an overcoat. Before he left, he gave instructions: "Now you dig out around your car, and pull it into the garage. I've got chains for my car, so I'll be fine." I watched him inch backwards up the steep driveway, making sure he cleared it. We waved goodbye at each other, and he headed off. As instructed, I swept the snow away from around my car, and pulled it into the garage.

I went down to the kitchen and made myself pancakes with Grandpa's waffle batter, left over from his elaborate breakfast from yesterday. He called at one point, seeing if I needed anything from the store. "How about popcorn?!" I asked. "That would be yummy on a day like today."
"Popcorn it is!" he said.

When he got home, gray hairs freshly trimmed, I bemoaned the fact that I wouldn't be able to get to the art store for Christmas-present-art-project supplies. He thought out loud about different driving routes I could try and then said, "Well. Why don't I just drive you."

So he did, taking us slowly and carefully through the covered, quiet streets: first to Kinkos, so that I could make copies for the art project, then to Blockbuster, where we picked out this movie, then on to the art store. Grandpa waited patiently while I made my selections, and helped when he had the opportunity. We chatted about many things, and wondered at the swirling flakes that floated ever more eagerly down. Stopped off at the grocery store on the way back, and got some crackers, wine, and Ghiardellis double-chocolate-chip brownie mix. When we got back home, he parked on the street below the house, leaving my Honda's cushy garage abode unrivaled. "Well. I'm glad I drove you," he said. "That way I didn't have to worry about how you were doing."

Back home, we made lunch: creamy tomato soup, and english muffins with ham and melted cheese on top. He told me about the story he's listening to on tape-- a gruesome crime mystery. After lunch, he took a nap, and I worked on my arts and crafts. He woke up just in time to catch me feeling very discouraged about the clumsy results.

"Sweetheart, I think they look wonderful!" he retorted.
I looked out at the snow and wished for a hand-hold, and began to feel a little heart-sick. I called to Grandpa that I was feeling awfully sad about things.
"Greta..." he said. "That's only natural." And he said kind things to ease the hurt.
Then he moved into stories about his trips to Europe with my Grandma. He told me about an amphitheater they had found in southern England that overlooked a cliff over the channel, and I began to forget about feeling sad. "Sweetheart, you'll just have to go there someday, " he said. "It was absolutely one of the most spectacular things I've ever seen."

Then he got out our cheese and crackers and drinks: wine for me, and gin for him. I moved to take a sip, and he said, "Wait wait!" Then finished pouring his. "Now. Cheers to the season." And we clinked glasses.

I cut my thumb trying to free the cheese from its plastic wrap. "Oh, oh, oh," he said, and whisked me upstairs. I thought again about the hand-hold, and felt heart-sick again, and I began to cry. I let Grandpa think it was because of my thumb, and he didn't comment. He put Neosporin on a band-aid, and layered it with a second one when blood started to seep through. "You take these band-aids down to your bathroom now and just use as many as you need. Because you know, you'll get your thumb wet, and you'll probably need another one."

Back in our kitchen nook, we watched the snow continue to drift down, and ate our cheese and crackers. I made the brownies, and he told me about his childhood in Eastern Washington.

Now he's making dinner, and afterwards we'll watch the 6:00 news, and then our movie, and then we'll watch "The Office." Grandpa will cringe at Michael Scott's antics and mutter things like, "He is just an idiot! The things he says!!" But he'll watch it with me anyway, because he knows I love it. When we go to bed, we'll holler goodnight, and when I wake up, he'll already be down in the kitchen and will have coffee ready for me.

I'm 24 years old. I know how to cook for myself, and make my coffee, and get myself a band-aid, and I bet I could even figure out driving in the snow if I needed to.

But Grandpa loves this. He loves taking care of me like this. And every time he does, I feel my heart getting bigger and growing softer in the dearest way. I wish I could express how much this man means to me.

The Shape of an Ending

A two-hour late start for school today leaves me with nothing to do at 9am. The huge ghastly project that was so vehemently decried in the last post was finished last night; there's nothing to do to prepare for school today. There have been many thoughts swirling, battering, racing around in my head over the last several weeks, but for today, it's easier to let the past do the talking.

I wrote this on February 1st, of this last year. It speaks to much of what I'm feeling today.

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Last night, I got home to find my Grandpa at his antique desk in our living room, with papers and calendars all around him. This is unusual: Grandpa is reliably watching the news or Jeopardy at 7:30pm. And if he's doing bill-paying or letter writing, he sits on the couch at the coffee table. The desk is more decorative than anything else. "Grandpa, what are you doing?" I asked him, amused. "What is all this?" He mumbled a few things, but didn't directly answer. I went into the kitchen to fix myself a late dinner. I called to him from the kitchen, a few things about the day, and my drive home.

He followed me into the kitchen with a calendar. It was a large Norwegian calendar, with foreign words and numerals, and brightly colored paintings. He and my Grandma always found these calendars on their trips overseas; it is one example of the classy antique European taste they cultivated for over 52 years.

Grandpa started murmering about dates on the calendar. "I found this old calendar sweetheart..." He showed me July 18th: an appointment to examine spots on my Grandma's lungs. We looked earlier; a check-in appointment to assess her knee-replacement surgery when my Grandma had mentioned her recent breathing troubles. In between the two: an appointment for a lung x-ray. We looked at later dates: an appointment with Dr. Henry Lee, the physician that would end up administering her chemotherapy and radiation. We didn't look ahead to the following year, but if we had, the month of October would have marked the date of her funeral.

It occurred to me in the kitchen, that my Grandpa was holding a type of graveyard, in the form of that bright Norwegian calendar. Date by date, there was chronologically depicted each step that would eventually lead to my Grandma's passing away. July 18th was the day I got the call, when working at my church kiosk, from Grandpa, telling me she had cancer. I vividly remember running into the sanctuary and sobbing; I remember trying to be quiet. I remember my dear co-worker Scott telling me to go home for the rest of the day. I remember the angry, fervent prayers later on, the capsizing hope. I remember hearing from my Dad when I was in Africa on a crackling intermittent cell phone call that she was terminal. These moments illustrate the tiny markers, the flagstones in my memory, that led to that ending.

It's odd to remember these unlikely markers. The most clear image of an ending I can remember from my last lengthy relationship was a silver tube of lavender lotion finally running out. Ted had given me that lotion when we were together, he'd sent it to me from California in a spontaneous act of affection, and I'd kept it for a long time, not wanting to use up the sweet present. After we broke up, I was even more reluctant to use it, even though it was such nice lotion, and smelled like soap and summer. What good thing would there be left of us when it was finally gone? But eventually it was. And by then, we had been over for some time.

I remember the marker for Africa ending. i was in the courtyard with Erica, and we were washing our clothes and hanging them on the line. I remember laughing at the surreal experience it still seemed to me: to be in AFRICA, and to be washing our clothes in big plastic tubs that always ended up with floating ants in the water. I said to Erica, "You know what's weird to think... that one day, all these little kiddos will just be pictures from far away. And this will just be 'that one summer I spent in Africa.'" I pictured myself in my 30's, meeting some Deputee that would be leaving for their big summer trip. I pictured myself commenting, "I did that once. I went to Malawi. I spent a summer there." In that Malawian courtyard, with my arms wet and my back warm, it was the most harrowing realization: to think that the children I had come to so enjoy, who I would give piggy-backs to that night, and who I would sing to in an hour or two, would someday only be shiny 3x5 pictures, and that my summer would only tug at my memory in passing.

I know beginnings have their own shapes too. I can recall many flagstones that would have marked the start of a path, of a journey, of a relationship. But today my thoughts are with the endings. Today, honestly: I wish for July 17th. I wish for something left of that lavender lotion. I wish for a hug from Tikambe, and for Clayton to be swinging from my back. I wish for floating ants in the laundry tub.