Monkey's blog: "grandma's story"

Desarae Barnes

            My Grandma has been sick with lung cancer for three and a half years now. She made the decision last summer that she no longer wanted chemo treatments. I guess for most people this would be hard to hear from a loved one but I understand. With the chemo she didn’t get out of her recliner and that’s not much of a life. So I visit her as much as I can and even though she stays in her chair she is still the strongest woman I know. She only has a little while longer with us but she’s ready when the time comes. When I visit, we talk about my schooling is going but mostly we talk about our memories.

            I don’t remember much about my childhood but what I do remember most of the time involves my grandmother. My strongest memory is of every Sunday. First grandma started cooking dinner before the morning church service. It was most of the time the same thing Roast Beef slightly seasoned and cooked for hours in the crock pot. The sides were cooked after church and they were rice and fried corn my favorite. When she was done she would do get us grandchildren ready for church. It was the only time I was aloud to stand on the kitchen chairs. I would stand there in my Sunday dress while grandma did my hair. When she was finished she would sing, “Hit the road jack and don’t you come back no more, no more, no more” then tap my butt with the brush and that was always my cue to jump down. Then if was off to church. When church was over she was back in the kitchen cooking dinner.

            Another memory I have isn’t really a specific one but more a general one. What is this memory you ask. Well its Grandma’s cookin` No one cooks like my grandma and oooie that southern cookin` is the best. She made everything from scratch. Banana Puddin`, Fried Corn Homemade Biscuits, anything you wanted grandma could make. I loved to help her bake. I would go pick blackberries, across the street, for homemade blackberry cobble, peel the bananas for the pudding. I loved doing the little things to help grandma cook. My grandma was always in the kitchen not always cooking but that was grandma’s place. She would be in there doing arts and crafts or talking with the ladies of the church, her duties as a preacher’s wife in a small town.

            As we sit and talk about the past I remember some things like working at the Roy Rodeo with her or the bazaar with her. But eventually I get frustrated and jealous hearing her tell me stories of things that happened while my cousins grew up with her, knowing she doesn’t have memories of me growing up and I don’t have them either. I didn’t see or talk to my grandma for seven years and not because she lived out of state or because I did. No it was because of her husband and what he did to me but that’s for a different story and another time.

            Most of the memories I have of my grandma are of her being sick and no matter how much that makes me sad, they are my memories and I cherish them. Soon I won’t have the chance to make new ones, so I cling to the one I have made and the ones I am making. Because when she is gone they are all I will have or her besides a few pictures and some of her ashes. I guess the hardest thing is not being able to cry or be upset for her right now because she won’t allow it. She knows heaven is getting ready for her and she is ready to go home when God calls on her. I might not be ready for her to go but to whine or throw a fit would be selfish and grandma taught me better then that.