Plant Vegetables

I feel that my blog is a strange place to mention the death of my grandmother. This public pseudoanonymous place doesn't seem to fit the very specific details surrounding such a great loss.

I was just beginning to feel close to grandma, not that she was ever cold or distant. It's just that I grew up so many miles away from her and I saw her so infrequently that it took extra effort to make a connection. After I visited her last Thanksgiving, she and I would talk over the phone every other week or so. And although she was hardly the kind to spill her guts over the phone or in any manner, I felt that each short and honest exchange of words was enough to build a real bond between us.

It was obvious that she wouldn't be around much longer, but since she'd managed to stay so healthy, independent and clear-headed well into her senior years, it was easy to take her presence for granted. It was so easy to believe that we could always see her next year, next time, whenever, since unlike a child in the family who is constantly growing, it was as if she would never change.

But everything changes. And Grandma's body finally stopped working. Several days before they took her to the hospital, during one of our last phone talks, I mentioned that people here were hoping for more rain. She said people are always asking God for more. I'd love to be able to talk to Grandma more and see more of her knowing looks, but I suppose that the world was more than lucky enough that she was here for so long. Here are a few thoughts Grandma shared during that phone call.

People are building houses everywhere, covering up the farms and leaving no place for the animals* to go.
We should all treat each other as human beings.
Plant vegetables.


*Grandma thought deer were delicious.