I lost my maternal grandmother just a few short months after I began this blog. Last year, I lost my paternal grandmother...the one I was really close to. It's been about six months, and I am thinking about her a great deal right now because Mother's Day just passed, and her birthday would have been next month. She was a June baby.
I miss her. I really miss her.
I was blessed to grow up with both sets of grandparents alive, and two great-grandmothers as well. Not many can say the same. I know that I wasn't just fortunate, but I was lucky. I knew the love of so many people, for so long.
Sometimes I look at old photos of her and wonder if she's the reason I have always wanted to be blonde.
I loved my paternal grandmother. So much so, that I packed my bags and moved to North Carolina with her the day I turned 18. I jumped in her Dodge pickup truck and ran away to the mountains and I didn't think that I'd ever go back.
We drank wine coolers and built a house and smoked cigarettes on the porch beneath shooting stars. That was a month of life lessons, guys. She helped me back out of an engagement with a man I didn't want to marry. She pointed her cigarette at me one night and said, "you don't have to marry the wrong man." So I didn't. My parent's didn't approve of that engagement, and I honestly didn't even want to marry him, but those words coming from her? They were akin to a battle cry of freedom.
She told me I was too smart to drop out of school, so I went back.
At her memorial service, someone called her feisty. I've been called the same. I never realized how much of an impact she made on my entire life until she was gone.
Someone - I think my mom - sent me this pic after she passed away in November, and I never realized how much I looked like her until I saw it. I have that Bagwell chin.
I have my mamaw's chin. I think it's a good chin.
2016 was a year of loss. So much loss, there are no words to describe it. 2016 BLEW. It was the worst year of my life. I don't even know how I'm still breathing, when I take a step back and think about all of the heartache I endured last year. Just when I though that I was laying at rock bottom, the proverbial rock bottom, scrambling to pick up the pieces, it fell out and I plummeted.
My grandmother, my Mamaw, was dear to me.
Hug the ones you love. You never know if it's going to be the last time you see them.
Tamie says
I know your Mamaw was thrilled having you around, she was always impressed with how you would get right in there with her, Pa and Hoover, and work til it got dark. I'm so glad that you were able to spend time living in their home with them, getting to know them better, and just making memories that will last your lifetime. I love that Bagwell chin!