I lived with my mom and my grandmother (along with my brother and my aunt) for about 10 years. We moved back home, moved in with my grandma and aunt, when my mom and stepdad divorced. I was almost 11. My grandmother loved me very, very much. She would take me to karate classes in the evenings and watch my training, telling everyone within earshot how proud she was of me, and how beautiful she thought I was. Sometimes she would be the one to take me to school, or to pick me up from soccer practice. She would let me sit next to her at church, and the sound of her singing hymns like Because He Lives is something I will never, ever forget. She always told me she loved me and was proud of me. Always. She never neglected one moment, one chance to make me feel special and important.
I loved her. I loved her in a way that is nearly indescribable. She was the best woman I've ever known. Best in every way.
I left for college in the fall of 2003. It was the first time I lived away from anyone in my family; it was the first time I lived on my own. I loved it! Classes were fantastic, I made fast friends, and my program was everything I wanted it to be. And the following spring I had an incredible opportunity to go with the Baptist Student Union on a mission trip during spring break to Panama City Beach, Florida- college's spring break capitol city.
It was an incredible start to the week. And my birthday was that week, too! I woke up that morning, and all the staff and students participating in the mission sang to me. What a great day! After the morning pancake breakfast we served to students off the streets, I spent the day fellowshipping and resting, preparing for the work that we did at night- walking around, having conversations with people, building relationships, praying, and giving drunk college kids rides so they wouldn't have to pay for a cab or attempt to drive somewhere on their own. About 30 minutes before we were supposed to head into town- the night of my birthday- I got a phone call from a family member:
"Andrea. Your grandmother had a heart attack. She's in the emergency room." And then he hung up. My heart stopped, too. I tried to call back repeatedly...no one answered. We were at a church, just having prayed in preparation for our work. I was in the hallway. I remember falling back against a wall and sinking down to the ground...hyperventilating....weeping. I was alone. I was states away from my family, from my grandmother who had practically raised me through adolescence. And I couldn't get hold of anyone for more information.
My campus minister, Jon, came into the hallway to see what had happened. I just cried and cried and cried while he prayed for her, and for me. And then, because we still had a job to do, everyone left. But me. I stayed in that hallway and cried until I fell asleep. I just cried myself into exhaustion.
Everything else was a blur. At some point, someone called me to let me know she was stable. I came home from the mission trip when the week was over. Sometime that semester, my roommate Tagan drove me the four hours home so I could lay in her lap and listen to her talk for just 2 hours before we had to come back to school. She was scheduled for open heart surgery the next day and the doctors couldn't tell us if she was going to make it or not. She did, but had to stay in the hospital, pretty permanently. I finished the semester and came home to spend my summer sleeping next to my grandmother every night in the hospital, curled up as best I could on a chair. Sometimes when the nurses would come in early in the mornings to give her food and medicine, I would hear her telling them to please bring in an extra bag of cinnamon teddy grahams, because she knew I liked them. And if they couldn't, she would just hide hers in the top dresser drawer so she could surprise me later. I remember opening that drawer one day and there must have been 20 or 30 little bags of cinnamon teddy grahams in there. She loved me.
She got to come home for a bit that summer. She was home for a day and a half. One night. She taught me to cook fried chicken and broccoli cheddar rice. I slept on the couch in the living room, because she had to sleep in the chair, and we didn't want her to have to sleep alone. She had another heart attack that night.
...It took me until just last fall to step into a kitchen again.
She went back to the hospital after that... and never came home. She stayed in that hospital for quite awhile. She went to a nursing home for 2 weeks, and then on to a different hospital.
And then the time came when I had to go back to school. It was a Wednesday. I went to see her one more time, and she was sitting up in her bed, surrounded by her whole family, talking and laughing, and making jokes. She hugged me and told me she loved me very much, and was proud of me. Then I left.
I got a phone call from my mom that Sunday morning, early. As soon as I answered the phone, I knew. She was gone. My whole family was there in the hospital, but I was 5 hours away at school. And all alone.
I came back home for the funeral, where I sat in disbelief while people who knew and loved my grandmother filed past me, patting me and whispering words of condolence with looks of pity and sadness on their faces.
I don't think I ever got over it.
It's been 8 years.
...I think I'm traumatized. I really do.
Since my grandmother died, I have a genuine fear of elderly people. I'm afraid at any moment they'll collapse, or have a heart attack, or forget who their loved ones are. The nursing homes that I frequently volunteered at in my youth suddenly became havens of grief and terror for me. I remember one summer I was working at a Christian camp in North Carolina and I was helping to oversee some of the mission work a few youth groups were doing in the area. I went with my supervisor to visit a group at a nursing home. I didn't even make it to the front door before collapsing into hot, horrible tears. I had to escape back to the car and wait for my supervisor to finish.
It's been that way since her funeral.
And watching this stupid Grey's Anatomy episode, seeing an elderly man begging his dying wife to come back to him just wrecked me.
I'm not even sure why I started writing this. Maybe it's cathartic or therapeutic in some way. Maybe it's just to make sure I never forget how truly lovely my grandmother was. I often think about what she might think of my current lifestyle, or the choices I have made or am making. I imagine things she might say to me, to encourage me on my path, or to help nudge me in the right direction when I know I'm not heading that way. I dream about what she would say to me on my wedding day, when she sees me all in white, beaming and eager to run down the aisle toward a new life.
But the reality always comes back. And sometimes scars don't always heal perfectly.
I'm sure I'm leaving some things unsaid. I'm not even positive I have the order of events perfectly correct. What I do know is that I was lucky and blessed enough to know Joan Eloise Harris for 20 years. I got to listen to her laugh, I got to learn from her wisdom, I got to feel her warm embrace.
And I'm grateful.
This was my grandmother and me at my high school graduation.
Yes, I realize I was blonde.
But just look at her smile.
She was extraordinary.
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