Manners, et al.

I have been tossing this blog post around in my head for a couple days. Thoughts, memories, wonders that have been dancing around each other this week with no obvious connection to each other. I thought I would write it out and hope they would make sense.

I got up this morning and check my Google Reader, and a friend had blogged about her grandma's recent passing. I lost it. I don't know how or why certain things all seem to happen at once, but that has been the story of my life. Good things, bad things: somehow they all seem to be oddly interconnected. I have long stopped trying to force a connection, or even make sense of the connection once I find it. Because maybe the connection itself is the point. I don't know.

So lately, I have been thinking about my Grandma Audrey. She passed away in 2002 (or was it 2003?). The biggest regret of my life has been not spending more time with her, getting to know her, getting to really know her, and learning her stories. She tried to connect with me, but I was a stupid, selfish teenager during that time and I never appreciated it. I feel like there are so many parts of me that are so her: organization, a love for propriety, craftiness (as in, glue and flowers, not like a villain), and a sense of responsibility for my own world. Those are the things I remember about her and whether or not that is what others remember or saw, that was my understanding and that's what I've carried with me.

After she passed away and I realized what I'd let happen (years of being a jerk and not getting to know her), I tried to get to know her husband, Grandpa Bob. Grandpa wasn't quite as easy to get to know. :) He was sweet, but not terribly talkative.
So here is where all this weird connection happens:

• One of the conversations I had with Grandpa was about his WWII days, and he and his military buddies hitching a ride to Hollywood to go dancing at the Palladium. Seriously, my grandpa was at the Palladium in the 40s. How cool is that? He's seen Glenn Miller and the like. He's danced with girls on that floor. (And I'll tell ya, Grandpa was quite the dancer.)
• He told me one of his favorite songs was Glenn Miller's "Pennsylvania 6-5000". He even recited a bit of it for me, and said the fun part of the song was when the orchestra would stop and everyone would shout "PENNSYLVANIA 6-5000!" Oh, to have been there!
• I knew Grandpa wouldn't be able to come to our wedding, but I racked my brain for a way for him to feel like he was there, and for us to feel it too.
• When Matt and I went ring shopping, the guy at the jewelry shop showed him a ring made of palladium. I turned to Matt and I said, "What's palladium?" I didn't realize it was a metal of some kind. We got that one.
• I scheduled a DJ for our reception, and when he asked what kind of music I wanted, I said, "I want it to sound like the Palladium did in the 40s." He said, "Artie Shaw?" I said, "Glenn Miller." He said, "Got it." (Whether or not he actually did that is another matter entirely, but the effort was there on my part.)
• I wore Grandma Audrey's ring on my right hand during the ceremony. Not her wedding ring, but the ring she always wore on her right hand (now, my most precious possession).

So when Grandpa Bob passed away last June, I genuinely felt the loss. I felt it in my gut. I felt like this man I actually knew (as much as I could by then) had passed away. Going through his things, guess what I took? Guess what my uncle and dad and aunt allowed me to take? His military pictures from the 40s.

More weird connections:

• Long talk with Matt this week about manners. Just a discussion. I love them. Not for the pretentiousness, but for the delicacy they bring to a situation. The way they make the other person feel honored, the little things you can do to make yourself welcome in any situation. I showed him "Miss Manners' Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior" and explained how my understanding of Grandma Audrey is that she was very well-mannered. Strong, smart, and well-mannered. She taught my mom about writing thank you notes, and I, in turn, learned the value of written notes. I still, to this day, prefer to hand-write thank yous. It's a small thing, but again, manners are about delicacy and honor, not big, showy displays. And that's how I remember Grandma Audrey.

• I have read everything Hester Browne has written. Her books are cute stories about how manners still fit in today's quick-and-dirty social contexts.
• Hester Browne actually wrote back to me on Twitter. (I nearly fainted.)

Another set of thoughts that intersected all of those thoughts (I've been busy):

• Grandma Ann is the one grandparent I do feel like I know. I am now afraid that she doesn't, and won't ever, really know me. What she does know seems to be fading.
• My spending time with her last summer was, partly, in hopes that she will remember being loved and cared for, because at any point, her memory will stop. I hope when it does, it stops on something good.
• I feel a faint panic in my chest when I think about her and how I haven't seen her in a few months and the longer I go without seeing her, the stronger the chance that she'll forget me completely.
• Even more poignant, is that she will eventually forget herself at some point, and I would very much like to tuck away all her memories into my own head, so they don't ever disappear completely.
• I wonder if Grandpa Dale (who passed away when I was 13) was ever at the Palladium with Grandpa Bob, before any of their children were born, before they were married. I only have his pictures to piece that together. The romantic part of me wants to make up a story about how maybe they were.

I'm not going to try to read any more meaning into all these bits. This is just what's been in my head lately. Bittersweet, fond, nostalgic... I pray I have the opportunity to spend more time with Grandma Audrey and Grandpa Bob and Grandpa Dale in heaven. I need to go see Grandma Ann.