Grandma was old.
Really old. From as long as I can remember she was old. She was in 1906 in San Francisco, she was already in her mid 60′s when my parents had me. Of course I don’t remember my first memory of her – stuff from that long ago is a jumble in my brain. But I do recall her house at 660 Bristol in Stockton filled with antiques. There were little articulated metal bugs on a table in the living room that I could carefully play with, and some white birch trees that lined the driveway, and the small kitchen with the princess telephone on the wall. As I recall she was always in the kitchen, and when you tasted her food it showed.
Throughout my life we were close, both philosophically and geographically. As a I was a young boy in Stockton, we were only separated by 6 blocks or so, then only 2 when I lived on Pajaro in Salinas. Everyone knew that she made the best Mac and Cheese. When I asked her the secret she told me to use a bit of garlic powder and of course supplement the orange stuff in the box with generous amounts of real, good, cheddar cheese.
When I was in the 6th grade we had a scare because she was hit by a car and hospitalized with a broken leg for quite a few weeks, but she made a full recovery, and attended my graduation, wedding, and many other significant events in my life. But this last broken leg, obtained when she fell after taking some tylenol #2 for a toothache was the beginning of the end.
Last monday, on Labor Day, she passed away at 102.
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Eric, I am sorry for the loss of your grandmother. That’s a lovely portrait. She’s beautiful!
You were her first born Grandson and she loved you dearly. She went to I. Magnin’s in San Francisco and bought a beautiful white satin buntin so you could travel in style to your first home. She didn’t know how to play with children, but once I found the two of you eating out of boxes of ceral on the kitchen floor in the Stockton St. house. The kitchen floor was carpeted and there was cereal from one side of the kitchen to the other. She wanted you and your brother to only have the best and tried to indulge both of you with food and the latest technology. Your Grandmother treated you as one of her contemporaries because she wanted to expose you to thoughts and ideas. SHE WAS SO PROUD OF YOU AND YOUR BROTHER AND LOVED YOU BOTH DEARLY! Always remember her with joy! Love, Mom
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