Written after the death of my grandmother.
Having been very close to my Dad's side of the family I was always in awe of the love my grandpa shared between my grandma.
After getting Alzheimer’s and being put into a nursing home, for over 9 years my grandfather would visit her every day and give her her favorite ice cream about once a week: Haagen-Dazs.
This isn't supposed to be a beautifully written story but just something I came across while looking through my journal and I thought it could, perhaps, be placed here and shared.
The first set of grandparents in the beginning is that of my mother's side; they didn't have a good relationship and once grandpa died it's like a doors been shut and no one can speak about him to my grandmother.
“True love, what does it truly mean?
Is it tolerating that person just because you’d feel guilty if you ever left? Does it even exist anymore?
4 Months after grandpa died, Grandma found herself a new husband. I don’t have anything against him; he didn’t do anything to me personally; he didn’t say anything terrible to me, he didn’t look at me with anger, even; he simply married my grandma too early and too late in life.
Grandma, did grandpa even live in your heart; or exist at all to you?
Did you even love him? Ever? Is life easier now that you ignore him – ignored his entire being? Do you ever remember him, the way he would have wanted you to remember him?
You will never realize how badly you hurt us by making the memories of my grandfather, my mother’s dad, and your husband, seem as though they never existed; we can’t even talk about him around you anymore.
Grandpa Auzins visited my grandmother ever day for 9 years in a nursing home. He fed her, took care of her, gave her gifts, and reassurance that he’s still there, beside her: forever and always. And most importantly, he tells her that he still, and always will, love her - just as he did the first day they met. And he kept that promise…until the very end.
True love? Most definitely.
With her hair unkempt, greasy, grey and dying, he still told her she was beautiful. Did he mean it? Absolutely. Because he wasn’t looking at her face, but into her heart – perhaps even remembering the memories they shared so long ago.
And at the very end, before she took her last breath, he brushed the hair from her eyes, gave her a tender kiss on the cheek and said, “Goodbye, deary, I love you.”
And he truly did.
For 9 years she couldn’t remember who he was, but it never stopped him from visiting…or caring. Grandma never spoke a word after the Alzheimer’s consumed her mind, she didn’t remember her children or even her grandchildren, but there were times in our visits that a tear would stream down her face. We liked to think those small tears were the words she was unable to speak: “I love you, too.”
“The littlest things. The wonder and the magic; two hearts that speak, perhaps, one to another. The unimportant things: love; as it is – no illusions. No storms at sea, no guilt, no glitter. Not the rustle of silk and the diamond garter. Just love, unadorned.” – Song of Love.
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