[Keep It Real - An Ode To My Grandma]
My Grandma is dead. But I have enough memories of her to last a lifetime. The biggest smile creeps over my heart when I think of her. When I remember who she was and what she fought for. I laugh when I remember her. Not because she had a great sense of humor
or often told funny jokes. I laugh because I remember how she would hide huge piles of $$$ in the granola boxes in her cupboard. I laugh because I remember how much she loved dairy queen. I laugh because I remember how she went on a different
diet every mouth. I laugh because I remember Edith. Edith was my
grandma's neighbor. And her very biggest enemy. Edith was the topic that kept her occupied all day. Edith was trouble. Let me tell you about Edith.
[pre]P.S. - It's not actually confirmed that my Grandma's viewpoint of Edith and the havoc she caused is true. It's probably not, due to my Grandma's paranoia. But I am going to write as if it is because the passion in her voice when she would tell us about Edith was so strong, you would think she found her evidence right from the Bible. Writing the stories like this, like I really believed her, will be a little way that I can honor someone who loved me so well.
My Grandma's flowers died because Edith poured chemicals all over them. But my Grandma caught on to this trick real quick. She would wait in the bushes at 3am with pots & pans, ready to bang them & surprise Edith when she would come over with the evil potion.
Edith turned the entire neighborhood against my Grandma. Even the postman, Edith got to him. It got to the point that Edith had told him so much slander about my Grandma, that she couldn't trust him with her mail anymore. Grandma had to walk to the post office with her mail in the dark to do her mailing. If she didn't do this people would follow her trail, steal her bills, or even put rat poison in her pills. Oh the nerve of Edith...
Do you want to know what else Edith did? She would park people in. Visitors would come to my grandma's house. And they would find themselves blocked with Edith's car in front of the driveway. Oh Edith. You would.
One of the most audacious tricks that Edith pulled was turn the entire church against my Grandma. Especially the choir, her lies got to them. One Sunday, instead of singing the doxology the choir sang, "Janet is loser..Janet is a loser" How rude of Edith to pull this trick the very same week that my Grandma's doctor told her that she needed to turn up her hearing aides.
One of my very last memories of the trouble that Edith caused happened around Christmas time. Edith would make a homemade fruitcake every year for each house on the street. My grandma's house was not excluded from the list. But her fruitcake was not made with love like all the other neighbors got. It was made with malice, and my Grandma caught on to this real fast. She was sure that fruitcake had some illegal substance in it, and was not going to touch it. So that year when Edith showed up at the door with the cake and a fake smile, my grandma said, "Edith...go drop dead" and she handed that fruitcake right back to her.
There are thousands of tales that I could tell about Edith. I grew up with Edith and the trouble that she would cause. Edith made the public bus late. Edith stole the coupons from the paper in the driveway. Everything bad that happened in my Grandma's life or in the lives of the ones my Grandma loved was always Edith's fault.
I love remembering Edith, because I love remembering my Grandma.
I laugh, close my eyes, and somehow I can still hear her yell, "Kids, get in the house, Edith is coming down the street"
