This lady here, she's my grandma. Ruthy is a lovely woman, and I completely adore her. My #1 biggest goal in life is to create a home filled with as much warmth as I felt in hers.
Grandma has a form of dementia. My grandpa passed away just over a year and a half ago, but I feel like Grandma left with him. The best option for our family has been to move her to a dementia care facility. Obviously that was a difficult decision, but she's reasonably content there.[Although that doesn't stop her from asking my mom 106 times daily why she can't live by herself.]
Clearly our relationship is very different now from what it once was. Every time I see her, she says she will write me. It's been years since she could pull together a letter. I always tell her I look forward to hearing from her and that's that. I'm content writing her without ANY expectation of a response. Well, my mom went to pick her up from church last Sunday and lo, there was a letter! A complete note to me sitting on her dresser. [Granted, not ten minutes later she said, "I really need to write Christie a letter sometime soon" but still.]
The letter is mostly small talk updating me on family events that happened anywhere from 1-6 years ago, so nothing special about what she wrote. But let me tell you, the fact that she wrote at all is positively priceless. It could easily be the last note she is able to write, especially considering we all thought her days of correspondence ended years ago. As my grandma would say, "Oh, Ruthy, I will treasure it always."
2 comments:
How sweet is that?
I definitely believe it isn't the thing itself you're given but the meaning behind it that matters.
In my cubicle, I still have a square piece of paper that one of my wife's special ed. students cut out for her to give to me. It's not a good cutting job by normal standards, but this kid has never been able to cut in a straight line. Yet, here is proof that he did.
For me, it's priceless.
Christie, I am so glad you got a letter from her! It agree that it feels like that we lost her with Grandpa. I know things her memory was terrible before he left too but its been so much harder since. that is amazing she was able to write you!
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