World Spins Madly On

I was the first grandchild to be born on both my mom's and dad's side of the family. So I don't want to sound cocky but...when I was born, I was kind of a big deal. There was a lot of excitement. Especially to my dad's mom, who didn't have any girl babies. She was really hoping that I would be a girl and then I was! She made a lot of quilts and blankets for me, and my favorite was a small, colorful quilt that I named "Quilty." Original, huh? Quilty is gender-neutral for those of you who may be wondering. 

I called my dad's mom D'Mama and she called me Lolly. No one else has ever called me that. We had so many adventures together. I think we were kindred spirits. I used to go stay with her and my grandaddy in Statesboro during the summers and she would take me to get ice cream and once she let me get a manicure. I got my nails painted royal blue and it was fabulous. She also took me to Tennessee to meet my great (maybe great-great? I'm not sure) Aunt Flossy and she took my brother and me to Disney World and then when I turned ten she took me on a cruise to the Bahamas. It was wonderful. 

Anne of Green Gables is one of my most favorite books ever. I re-read it last week and cried when it ended because it's just fantastic! D'Mama and Grandaddy went to Nova Scotia (the location of all the Anne books) when I was little and bought me all eight books in the series and an Anne doll. D'Mama realized way before I did that Anne and I are soulmates. 

So back to Quilty. I slept with Quilty every night growing up. Whenever I cried, I ran to my bed so that I could cry on Quilty. It was just so soft and I knew that it contained so much sweet love from D'Mama that I was super attached to it. But then, unfortunately, in middle school, it wasn't cool to sleep with a quilt that your dead grandmother made for you when you were a baby, so I had to force myself to stop sleeping with Quilty. Because of peer pressure. Isn't that the dumbest thing you ever heard? Now that I'm in college, I know multiple people who still sleep with blankets from their childhood and I don't love them any less for it. I have respect for them. But I was in middle school then, and very susceptible to what other people thought, so from then on I only slept with Quilty when I was really sad or scared. I still do it sometimes now. Quilty is not in my apartment with me, but it's in my closet at home and I always sleep with it the night before I go somewhere where I'll be for more than just a night or two. Just because it makes me feel cozy in my heart. 

D'Mama had lupus. I'm not quite sure when she got it, but she had it for a while. It caused her to have a lot of miscarriages when she was young, to lose a finger (I think it was her middle finger on her left hand but I'm not sure) and then she lost a ton of weight. I don't really remember her at a healthy weight; I only remember her looking like a ghost. It was scary but I didn't realize how bad it was. The cruise she took me on for my tenth birthday was only about four or five months before she died, but I had no idea that she was very sick at all. I just knew she was seasick the entire time we were on the ship and that she had to nap every afternoon, which was actually kind of awesome because I just got to roam around the ship while she was asleep in the afternoons. I ate a ton of soft-serve ice cream cones and rode the elevator to the bottom floor, where I'm pretty sure unattended ten-year-olds aren't allowed to go, but I never got caught. I used to pretend I was the captain's daughter and I lived on the cruise ship. I loved standing on the top deck and feeling the salt breeze blow through my hair and I felt invincible. And like a princess. At the same time.

But then D'Mama died the October of my fifth grade year. I actually remember the last time I talked to her. It was over the phone and at that point, my brother and I both knew that she was really really sick and somehow we knew that we would probably never get to talk to her again. But unfortunately, I don't remember what she said. I remember that my brother and I both cried a lot and she said she loved us so many times, but I don't remember what else she said. I really wish I could remember. 

My D'Mama was so special to me. We had such a sweet relationship and got along famously. There's a picture of her when she was sixteen in the dining room at my house and my dad says I look like her. That's the highest compliment I've ever gotten. 

Anyways, back to Quilty again. Quilty isn't very long or wide; it's a little shorter than me but wraps around me. However, D'Mama did make some quilts that were bed-size. One of them was the quilt that I used on my bed at Camp this summer. And sometime during the summer, I noticed that there was a hole in the quilt. And then I got really sad. Because these quilts are great physical reminders of D'Mama, but what am I supposed to do when they all fall apart? I'm a major pack rat and I like to keep things as long as possible. And when I have to throw things away, I get really emotional (when I was eight one of my pairs of shoes died and I cried all.night. My parents had to take a picture of me with them so that I could remember them forever). 

But what if all of the quilts she made fall apart and then I have nothing to remember her by? And then what if I forget her? She was sassy and funny and she lent her wedding dress to a ton of girls who didn't have very much money and she instilled in me a love of the smell of oranges and cloves and she thought Tellietubbies were evil. I don't want to forget her or any of the memories I have with her. But the truth is, I'm going to. I already have forgotten some. And I'm not quite sure how to cope with that or make it better. That's just one of the parts of life that's really terrible - the fact that you forget things. Not like homework, but like memories of your grandmother. 

But I guess that's just another result of sin in the world. Death exists, and then we forget people. I hate it when people say that someone dead will "live on in our hearts" because that's dumb and cheesy. They will not live on in our hearts because they will not be living. They will be dead. And we will be living and busy taking classes and painting walls and babysitting adorable tw0-year-olds and ironing shirts and swimming in lakes in Tennessee at midnight and vacuuming baseboards and making friends and drinking slushies and putting handles on dresser drawers and setting clocks to the right time and singing songs and sitting in desk chairs. It's harsh, but it's truth. Life is going to go on. 

But the thing is, during all of the craziness and the business, suddenly you're struck with a memory. Like sometimes when I go shopping and I'm trying on a shirt that's too tight on me and then I'm trying to take it off, I'll hear D'Mama's voice say "skin the cat" as she helped me take off shirts in dressing rooms when she took me shopping so long ago. 

So I guess I don't need to worry after all. It is sad that holes have to happen to quilts. It's even more sad that sin is in this world and people have to die. But that's why we have Heaven to look forward to and sweet memories of happy times to tide us over until then. I mean, sweet memories are obviously not nearly as wonderful as the real thing. Because the real thing is freakin awesome. But if I'm sad all the time then I will miss out on new memories and new friends and cloudwatching days and stargazing nights. And those are things that I don't want to miss. 

Memories of D'Mama will continue to pop up at random times in my life, and I cannot wait. Because I really like remembering her.

Love, 
Lauralicious