My Grandma would've celebrated her 88th birthday yesterday. After a very short and painful bout with colon cancer, she went home to the Lord when I was just a freshman in college. At the ripe young age of 72.
She helped me carry boxes up to my dorm the first day of freshman orientation in August of 1996... and by Halloween, I was attending her funeral. At the time, it just didn't seem real to me.
After all... she seemed healthy when I'd left.
I remember getting phone calls and letters from my parents... the gravity of my father's tone... "She has had this bruise on her leg that just won't heal."
By the time she had it checked out... the cancer was everywhere. Hospice was called. God bless those people. Heroic they are. Such dignity they give.
And yet - in between these phone calls... I was, for lack of a better word... an utter asshole.
TOTALLY consumed with college life and all the new independence that came along with it. Classes, and track practice, teammates, roommates, and new friends, and schedules, and social agendas, and of course, boys.
I was 18, and stupid.
It was the most self-centered time of my life.
Do you know my dad wrote me one letter (like, long hand on yellow legal pads) each week for the entirety of my freshman year? I kept every single one. Have them all still to this day.
But, guess how many times I wrote him back? You're right. Zip.
Yes, I called... and we chatted... but I never took the extra time to return that same kindness and thoughtfulness to him.
Guess who else I have a few letters from?... Yep. Grandma Dorothy. She was selfless and kind until the very end. Even in her pain... those few months between August and October... when she was going through hell... she took time to write to me at school and ask how I was enjoying my new adventure.
And yes - I still have those letters too. But I can't bring myself to open them. I feel so ashamed. Because I know what I was thinking about while she was writing them.
I was thinking about the dumbest most insignificant crap while she was suffering and thinking of others.
That feeling right there... yeah, it sucks.
Geez, I miss her. I think of her all the time. I wish Clark could have known her. I wish my kids could have. I wish that she would've been around when I finally wised up and realized that I could indeed see past the end of my own nose. Oh, the conversations I would've liked to have had. The good advice she would've imparted.
Here's a confession... everytime I came home, through to my senior year, after she'd died, I would take a jog and go to her grave. And ask her for her forgiveness for my selfish attitude. And I would cry. A LOT. Yet, I know she wouldn't have wanted me doing that... weeping at a place where clearly I wouldn't find her. Again being selfish - NEEDING to wash my shame away.
My senior year, I recieved a gift. She came to me in the most vivid dream. I had fallen asleep for only an hour yet it was the most incredible dream of my life. I remember it perfectly. And when I woke - I called my mother immediately - sobbing.
The dream was this...
I was at school, back in my freshman year dorm... walking across the quad... on my way to check my mailbox inside the commons. A beautiful woman with the most incredible skin, dressed in the most unique 1940's ish dress with perfectly curled hair and red lipstick sat in her navy buttoned up dress on a bench at the far side of the lawn watching me walk on by. She had a boquet of flowers laying next to her. I noticed her. She watched me the whole way... and I watched her out of the corner of my eye. She said nothing, but smiled.
I went inside the commons and unlocked my box. Inside was a "pink slip" which is the best thing you could get in you mailbox back then. It meant you had a package to pickup at the desk. LOOT from home! Yippee! When I turned in my ticket to the clerk he said... "Oh, there's no package... The woman on the bench outside is your gift."
I rushed back out... and by the time I was within 20 yards of her I knew who it was. It was my Grandma - restored to the glory of her youth. She was perfect. Young and healthy... and I fell into her arms and sobbed... "WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN??????" She was so real I could smell her sweet scent. The scent of my childhood.
She said in the most gentle voice... "Child, I've been to the most amazing places. Doing God's work. Don't cry. I've come back to check on you. To tell you I love you. I can't stay long."
To which I replied... "NO! YOU JUST GOT HERE! YOU CAN'T LEEEEAAAVE!!!"
And she waited a moment...
And then I said, "Well then, we have to call EVERYBODY!!! My dad... Aunt Barbara... Uncle Don! All the grandkids....! You're really HERE! I can't believe it" And I hugged her again so tight I could barely breathe.
And just like dreams go - we sorta wooooshed from that spot there on the lawn to her tiny stone house back in my hometown. And everyone was instantly there. One by one, they each took a turn with her in a room alone. Where, I presume, she shared whatever special message she came to give each one of us.
I did not take a turn. I'd had mine already.
And then... I woke up... and called my mom... and recounted the whole thing through lots of sniffling and eye wiping. That dream shook me to my core. How could I have been dreaming that deeply and vividly in just an hour's time? I was, and still am today, convinced that it was no dream, but a gift from God. That I was indeed visited.
Fourteen years after she died, I was finally able to honor this most beautiful soul in a manner befitting her.
I gave birth to this baby girl... and we called her Dorothy Lucille. After her two great-grandmas on my side.
My Grandma Dorothy was just an incredible person. And anyone who ever met her would agree. She never had an unkind thing to say. She always had time for you. She lived simply. (She only had one pair of shoes as a kid... I remember hearing those stories.) She loved abundantly. And she devoted herself to the Lord in a way that Saints would want to emulate.
Yes - sometimes I feel robbed. Robbed of time with her. So many of us who feel loss like that... the hurt just goes on. It softens with time - but it's always there. And some days it just bites you. And the lesson there is - don't waste the time you have with the ones you love on foolish things. Amen?
The good news is - I WILL SEE HER AGAIN. The sting of death is something we only experience as humans. When we return to the glory of God's kingdom... it's all gone. What a day that will be.
I hold onto that.
I think I'll end this post right here... Maybe it will serve some redemption. I finally wrote back.
And, because I need to go blow my nose and ring out my shirt... it's soaked with tears....
Love you Grandma D.
xoxo
Here I am in her kitchen, 1981. I adored her then... can't you see? So many memories.
