This day, hour, minute in 2007 my Grandma Irene is no longer in my life.  By the time most of you read this, on April18, it will have been over 1 year my grandma died.  I never thought things would be “ok”, normal, but sadly they are. 

I remember April 17, 2007 close to 8am’ish I got the call to go to Grandpa’s house b/c “its time”.  By the time my sis and I got there, 6-13 minutes later, Grandma was already gone.  I remember laying on her bed and hugging her. I cried and held my Grandma’s body.  I told her I loved her, again.  The night before I sat with her and just talked.  I held her hand, helped to change, dress and medicate her.  I held her hand.  I kissed her.  I touched her and brushed the hair from her face.  I saw my Grandma in the way I never thought I’d see her, but it didn’t bother me because she needed us girls that night.  I was one of the last people to care for her in life.  And I’m glad I was strong enough to do so.  It wasn’t easy, let me tell you that, but it still needed to be done to care for her.

When its my turn to leave this life, I just pray that I can rely on the same family strength in my girls to take care of me the way we, my family, took care of my Grandma, in her last weeks and days of her life on earth.  I don’t have six children, the way my Grandma did, but I do put my faith in my two girls and their future families.  We made her comfortable and she left life with her dignity.

I had a few moments of “break down’” today/yesterday but I didn’t give in.  Not because I’m heartless, on the contrary, its because I have to care for my girls.  And what good would I be to them sending them to school reminding them of their great-grandmother’s death? 

I don’t have pictures to sare, today, because our PC is being worked on and I’m functioning on Mister’s lap top.  But I do have memories of her.  She was a MEAN ol woman!  LMFAO!  I’m not even playing!  I think it was the Indian blood in her.  If not, then it was the hard knock life she lived to be with my Grandpa.  She left her “COZY”  and I use that term loosely, life of a kid to marry my Grandpa.   She married at the age of 17 and started her OWN family of six  children, fourteen grandchildren and twenty-one great-grand-children, still with a couple yet to be born this year. 

She was a worker at my school when I was a child.  All the office ladies knew her.  She was the one who taught me to address the office workers as Ms. {blank}.   NO ONE fucked with my grandma.   Seriously.  None of US fucked with my grandma.   Whenever we fucked up we had to deal with her, in her own ways and man NO ONE wanted to deal with her!!  LOL

I have to admit I went through a few years when she and I didn’t speak.  And that was because I was drugging my life away.  What parent or grandparent wants to see and deal with that shit?  She was old school.  She dealt with it by being MEAN!  lol  But in the end we worked our differances out and she leared to like me again.  Before she died she told me twice she loved me.  This meant alot to me because I have never in my almost, then, thirty-four years of life, don’t remember her saying that to me, or any of us.  It just wasn’t her.  But she told me.  And it means alot to me.

I am alot like her.  I’m hard to get to know.  I am a fiesty woman.  I am mouthy.  It takes alot to gain my trust.  I may be small but those who know me know I AM a force to be reckoned with.  Fuck with ime?   I can handle it.  But don’t fuck with my family. 

I was named after her and her mother and now I know why.  The same reason why my niece was named after me.  Its destiny. Its who we ARE suppose to be.  I am Irene’s girl.   I am the eldest grandchild and I am a proud person. 

Today I miss my Grandma,  but its OK, because she is with me and part of who I am.  Because she is a part of my being, she is an influence on how I raise my daughters.  And because of her, my Grandma, I am raising beautiful, compassionate, strong, well rounded, opinionated, stand up young woman.  So yes, I do miss my grandma, today, but even though she is not here to guide and influence me she will ALWAYS be a part of how I raise my children.   And I have to say that at almost 40 of us, we’re not doing so bad.