Simple Gestures

On Saturday CO and I were out Christmas shopping, and stopped to get some lunch. The restaurant was crowded, so we had to wait for a seat. We were having a successful day, and I was feeling cheerful and festive.

While we waited, a woman in her early thirties came in with an elderly woman and a baby. They sat near us while waiting for their own table. I heard the woman call the older lady "grandma", and I watched as the older woman played with the baby, obviously her great-granddaughter.

My own grandma passed away nearly three years ago. Although she had been ill for many years, her life wasn't immediately threatened, and her death was a bit of a surprise. While there is never a good time for these things, this happened very late in January, and for those of you who know my profession, you realize the timing was really, really bad.

I was very close to my grandma. She adored me. I was her only grandchild, and I rarely did anything wrong, as far as she was concerned. While I know (believe me, I KNOW) I am not perfect, it was nice to have someone around who thought I was. The rest of my family, they love me, of course, but they are a little more realistic about my, uhm, perfection status.

Anyway, she adored me, and I adored her. I don't know how other people saw her. I know she could be picky and demanding and a challenge to deal with...for other people. But not as much for me. I think I saw a side of her few others ever saw. If others saw her as frugal, where I was concerned, she was unfailingly generous with both time and money. If others saw her as cool or distant, with me she was nothing but warmth and love. If others saw her as difficult to please, well, I had very little problem with this. I already mentioned the perfection, didn't I? From my perspective, she was the best grandma anyone ever had.

Her loss was terribly difficult for me. But I had to hold up for my mom, and my grandpa. Although they were doing remarkably well themselves, I felt like I had to hold up for them, or with them, or something. Likewise for my boys. Although she was not their biological great-grandmother, she loved them as if she were, and she did more for them than others with those biological ties*. Also, they had very little experience with death at this point, so I felt I had to hold up for them as well.

So I kept it in. All that emotion. All that loss. I kept it in. I planned to find my own quiet alone time once we got back home, when I could let it all out.

But I got home, and work got crazy, and I just didn't have time for all of that. To make matters worse, CO and I were having some marital problems during that period, and I was having a to keep all of those emotions in check too, so I could get some work done. Whenever a hint of an emotion threatened, I could almost visualize myself stuffing it all in a little box, turning a small gold key in a lock, and packing the box away beneath bigger, heavier boxes that needed more urgent attention.

I figured I would face it eventually, when things calmed down. Which, of course, they did. April came, and work eased up, and CO and I went to a marriage counselor, and we all came out the other side.

That May I went to see my grandma's grave. I expected that to be the time when the emotions finally came. But they didn't. It felt too disconnected. That cold headstone had my grandma's name on it, sure, but it had nothing to do with her. She wasn't there. And I had gotten so good at packing that box, it was easy to do it once again. And again. And again.

Her birthday, the first holiday season without her, the anniversary of her death. These were all difficult days, but still the flood of emotions I was expecting never came, and somewhere along the way, I had stopped expecting them.

If I let myself think about it too much, I thought I had failed her somehow. What kind of a testament to her, to my love for her, to my relationship with her, was all this stoicism? But regardless, stoic I stayed.

Then, nearly three years later, CO and I are innocently waiting for a table, and in walks this woman with her grandma and her daughter, and I am watching them interact. It was lovely to see them together, and feel the warmth of family and the holiday season. It made me smile.

Then the woman reached out and took her grandmother's hand. Such a simple, beautiful gesture. And I began to cry. Right in the middle of the restaurant, completely unexpectedly, I began to cry.

CO looked over, astonished, and before he could ask what was wrong, I held up my hand and said "Don't ask me now." I couldn't speak. I could barely breathe.

That box...the one that had been under lock and key for nearly three years...the one I was saving for a quiet, alone time, had inexplicably sprung open by the witnessing of a simple gesture between two total strangers.

This will be our third Christmas without her, and suddenly I missed her so much, I couldn't stand it. I thought of how much she joy she would have had in my little granddaughter, who will never know her, and the remarkable woman she was. I thought about the fact that I will never again reach out and take her hand. And for several long, painful moments, I fought to compose myself in the middle of the restaurant.

I got it together, and CO continued our day in relatively high spirits, but I am still fighting a residual sadness that I had not allowed myself to feel before. A sadness I never expected this late in the game. A sadness I thought I had conquered already. A sadness that, I guess, will never really go away, and can spring up at the most unexpected times, for the most unexpected reasons.

I guess simple gestures are never all that simple.


(*In case anyone is keeping score, this is not a slam at my in-laws in any way, but at the boys' maternal grandparents. Thought I better throw that out there, just in case. You never know.)