When I was pregnant with Honeybun, my Nana whom I dearly loved and adored got very sick. Around the time of our wedding, she began falling and having problems remembering things. That next spring, the local art museum hosted a traveling Degas exhibit and since my parents were in town visiting, we decided to all go.
I knew it would be sort of a “last hurrah” with my Nana as her health was fading fast and she had become agitated, mean and feisty. That morning I arrived at her house, so excited to both go out with her and see the Degas paintings which I’ve been enamored with nearly my entire life.
But she was not having it. She was in no mood to go and let us know. She became argumentative and probably threw around few nasty and hateful words as she had gotten in the habit of doing.
It broke my heart. I was devastated that she did not want to spend that time with me but even more so devastated seeing in full force that it was the beginning of the end for my previously warm-hearted and loving Nana.
My parents suggested hubby and I still go but I didn’t want to. I want to go with Nana, not just to go. Holding back the tears, I decided to just go clear my head and hopped in the car. Hubby jumped in beside me and we drove up the coast.
We ended up at an ice cream shop in a little beach town we’d never heard of. I poured my heart out and shared my fears of losing Nana at such an important time in our lives. I desperately wanted her to meet her first great-grandchild, to know our children and for our children to know her. It didn’t work out that way, we lost Nana just a short time later when I was 28 weeks pregnant.
Yesterday morning, hubby decided to take us out for breakfast. He found a restaurant with good reviews out at the beach, directly east of our house. It was a beautiful Fall morning, cool enough to comfortably sit outside with a nice breeze (which sometimes gusted fiercely and carried our napkins away).
We had a lovely breakfast, the kids were in great moods, Pipsqueak slept peacefully in the buggy. And when I was done with my meal I just took it all in.
My loving husband, my amazing children, this beautiful life. And then it hit me: this was the place. The little beach town where I bared my soul over ice cream. And here we were, back 7 1/2 years later with my heart spread all around the table and I was engulfed by sadness. My four beautiful children that will never know my Nana, the woman who I adored and who meant the world to me.
I’m sure we’ll be back to that little beach town, the food at the restaurant was excellent and the line to get in was wrapped around the building by the time we left. But I can’t help but wonder if those same feelings will overcome me each time we return.
We headed home and I walked in the house and immediately went to change Pipsqueak’s diaper (I’ve learned not to push my luck with the cloth diapers!)
I was immediately over taken by the smell of our new furniture we just received last week, our dining room table and a desk for me to work on. We’ve been waiting for the pieces since we moved into our new house in May. We set aside a spot for each and have already found both very useful.
But I smell it every time I walk through the room, the familiar smell of love and memories. The furniture belonged to my Gran’ma. It’s the same table I ate Thanksgiving dinners at growing up. The same desk I admired by the front door that seemed so grown up and special. The same smell that was her.
It’s amazing how our memories can feel so alive and present in our current situations. How a place, a smell can bring back so many great memories yet flood us with sorrow for those we have lost.
I look at tiny little Pipsqueak and all the love he is surrounded by but I am also saddened that he will never know any of the amazing Great-Grandparents that his brother and sisters knew.
