dragonfly
11-29-2009, 08:14 AM
I received a really neat gift on Thanksgiving- it was a little booklet of my grandmother's poetry that my aunt put together. My maternal grandmother died back in 1992 from a bad stroke, following two years of a decline from Alzheimer's disease. My grandmother was never a warm and fuzzy grandma that made cookies and had the grandchildren over to spend the night. She was a stalwart brainy woman who had her share of pain and suffering in her life, and handled it with a matter-of-fact resoluteness. She was the type of woman whom you loved, but never felt close to. I don't think it was her intention, but just her nature.
Anyway, grandma had bouts with uterine and breast cancer relatively early in her life, and survived treatment and lived for another 35 years or so. She also sent her only son off to Annapolis where he started a military career, and he never came back home to live, although he stayed in close contact with her. I think this was very difficult for her.
In her dark times, Grandma wrote poetry, probably to help her cope with the stresses in her life. I was given a copy of Grandma's book of poems on Thanksgiving, and reading through her poems, I can see her in myself, or see myself in her, whatever the case may be. Her heartaches and her loves run parallel to the very things I have written about at various periods of my own life. In reading her words, I feel like I finally understand her because a part of her lives on in me.
Anyway, just wanted to share a few thoughts and this neat gift I received in getting to know my grandmother a little better than I ever did as a child.
Anyway, grandma had bouts with uterine and breast cancer relatively early in her life, and survived treatment and lived for another 35 years or so. She also sent her only son off to Annapolis where he started a military career, and he never came back home to live, although he stayed in close contact with her. I think this was very difficult for her.
In her dark times, Grandma wrote poetry, probably to help her cope with the stresses in her life. I was given a copy of Grandma's book of poems on Thanksgiving, and reading through her poems, I can see her in myself, or see myself in her, whatever the case may be. Her heartaches and her loves run parallel to the very things I have written about at various periods of my own life. In reading her words, I feel like I finally understand her because a part of her lives on in me.
Anyway, just wanted to share a few thoughts and this neat gift I received in getting to know my grandmother a little better than I ever did as a child.