jezebel

Sitting in my grandparents office, taking in the smells of my childhood, I snatched up a book. I did not look at it first; I simply dug into the bookcase, and took the one my finger tips touched first. Laying on the third futon in 4 days, I chuckled when I read the title. It was a small book, a mere 97 pages, but it contained pieces of my life. Intrigued, I opened it to read the first sentence and broke down into tears-tears that have not come in months, oddly enough.
"You may be thinking, But why is it necessary to cry out? Doesn't scripture tell us that God knows our hearts? When we utter a prayer in our heart or mind, surely there's no critical need to express aloud what God already knows."
Wow. An unspeakable 'wow'.
To those who are confused as to why this quote holds such an unbreakable grasp on me... I will not go into great detail here, but if you wish, ask me about it in person. It really should be discussed in person anyway.

I have the fishbowl feeling again. It never does go away, but there are times when it weans it's way out of my everyday life. Not today. Today is a flood of fishbowlness. Who knows why it is obvious one day and scarce the next?

For the past week I have been soaking up the sun in California. I did not come back with a tan but I did come back with a stronger understanding of love and family. My grandparents have been married for 60 years. My grandfather, 84, is in the early stages of alshiemerz and my grandmother, 82, is the rock. He may not be able to cut his own food, remember his daughters names, or even know what he did in the previous five minutes, but he does remember the life they shared together. No, he obviously does not remember everything; goodness, I heard him even call his wife his mother once. She corrected him quickly. Even through this deterioration of memory the bond still exists.
I don't know how to explain it. Maybe it is something you have to witness yourself, I don't know. All I can truly say is when I would see them hold hands and just sit...(I don't want to get sappy but) I could not help but think that that was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

My grandmother is a spitfire. One night I was talking with her and one of my aunts and my grandmother says out of the blue, "Sex, sex, sex. That is all people talk about these days. It is everywhere. I had no clue about that kind of stuff before I was married. I tell you, I was in for a surprise." My aunt and I looked at eachother in a kind of awkwardness and giggled. The subject turned to questions of how much I knew about the subject, and I quickly turned it into a different direction. Furthermore, my grandmother and I were picking oranges off of one of their trees and a neighbor boy (more teenagerish) was outside and she muttered to herself, "I wonder if he has been smoking dope again." She looked at me and smiled. "Well he does." HA!
Alrighty, one more. She took my grandfather for a ride and I went along to go into Trader Joes to help pick something up for her. As I was getting out of the car she told me she would jsut wait in the car with her husband. As he looked over at her she laughed and said "Don't hurry Renae, we are going to make love in the car." The look on my grandfather's face was priceless-confusion and utter shock.

Whoever reads this may believe that I am 'better'. Not to break it to you, but I am far from it. Break has taught me that. Please, let's sit down with a cup of coffee and talk this out. Just listen. Listen. No advice. Do not pretend you understand. Do not say things happen for a reason. Do not tell me things will be fine. Listen. Listen.

Just listen.