Farewell Grandma: a Valediction

To say that Mae Harrison—Mother, Sister, Grandmother, Great Grandmother and Great-great Grandmother—was a good person, is like saying the sun is big. It’s true, but it doesn’t say enough. You’re leaving out so many important details like how bright the sun is; how it keeps us warm in the day and how dark the world gets when it’s gone.

My Grandmother—Gram to me and many of her grandkids—was a bright star who shone her light down on so many of us. In the days since her passing, I’m sure everyone who knew Gram has been thinking of all the great stories and little moments that make up her life.

It makes me smile to reach back beyond the darkness of her last few years to think of the moments, both big and small, that I was able to share with her: The happy summers I spent running around her back yard climbing her trees; the many Christmases I spent in her home absorbing the spectacle of Christmas decorations that adorned every inch of her tiny house as though Father Christmas had thrown up everywhere. I think happily of the times she singled me out and invited me as a kid to stay with her, or the excitement I would feel when I got home from school and heard her voice in the other room and I would run in and give her a big hug. I remember taking road trips with her out to Nova Scotia or off camping up north, a copy of the Righteous Brothers playing over and over again in the tape deck. I think of the happy day when she agreed to move in with my family and we were lucky enough to have her in our home, even for just a few years.

One story I don’t remember well but that Mom keeps repeating for me comes from a time when I was just a toddler. Grandma was on the phone and I had just pooped on the carpet. Ever the helpful and fastidious child, I picked the little parcel up and handed it to her saying, “here Grandma.” No screaming, no cries of horror, she just calmly spoke into her end of the phone and said, “Oh dear, I’ve got to go.” And she took care of it.

As I think about that story of so long ago, I realize it provides a metaphor for how she was in life. People came up to her, placed their poop in her hands and she would calmly, and always lovingly, take care of it for them. She shared everything she had, from those things she had in modest amounts like her money and her home, to those items in which she had an endless store (her love, her kindness). She was giving to the very end.

She was the matriarch, the nucleus of the family and our leader. Not a stern military commander but the warm glow; the glittering fire around which we would all gather for holidays, for times when we wanted to talk, to be happy or, in our sadness, to find comfort. It’s hard not to think about how cold it seems now. How lost we all feel.

The last years of her life were not easy. She struggled to fight an illness that tried to transform her into something else and although it took things from her, in the end, it never took her kind spirit or her beautiful smile. When I looked on Gram in her last years, perhaps she didn’t remember me, but she looked back on me with love and unfailing kindness.

On December 8, 1925, the world became a better place. Today, it feels a bit darker, a bit colder and a bit sadder. I look for the fire that once burned and see only ashes—feel only the memory of a warmth we used to crowd around. But feeling lost and looking up at the night sky, I am comforted. So distant, yet close enough I could reach up and touch it, Grandma’s star shines brightly; our angel, forever shining; forever watching over us.