My mother's mother died last Friday but I just found out this morning at work. I was returning a call to my brother's text stating "call me i'm breaking up with my boyfriend". I called to make sure he hasn't shaved his head or started having cocktails for breakfast and he tells me our Grandmother died.
I think I've only met her three or four times in my life. I remember she smoked a lot and was really small. She had these big bug eyes and a nice smile and I got my blonde hair from her. I think I was in high school the last time I saw her. She stayed in my room. We had to wash the drapes after she left.
I didn't know her at all. All I ever heard was that she was really mean, nuts and had been her whole life. She once sent me five dollars in a birthday card for cab-fare. I was in Junior High and I lived in TX. I'd never even ridden in a cab and the card came about six months before my birthday.
In all of the old photos our family has of her, she is unbelievably beautiful and looks the spitting image of Bette Davis.
My mother once told me a story about coming home from school and she found her mother sitting in the dark, in the parlor with all of the shades drawn. She was chain smoking and talking to the television set that was turned off.
I always picture it in black and white.
I hope my mom is ok. She spent most of her young life trying to protect her brother and sister from her mother and most of her adult life trying to protect my brother and I from having to deal with someone like her.
She says she has dealt with it. She told me that no one wanted to give her mother a service or memorial and so they weren't. That was when I cried.
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