Remembering Maw Maw

There are not very many treasured childhood memories that do not include my Maw Maw, Dorothy Moore. Maw maw was my mom's mom and from the time I was very young until she passed away when I was 27, her fingerprints have been eternall etched into my very soul. Being her first grandchild came with many priveleges not the least of which included having her undivided attention for four years!

I can remember being very young--probably no more than 2 and spending the night with her quite often. My mom married my dad wwhen she was 15, gave birth to me at 19 and by 21 wa ready to regain some of her own lost childhood and who could blame her? She left my dad but as a high school dropout with no skills, there were little opportunities for employment that would pay the bills and feed a small child other than waiting tables or tending bar so that is what she did. This meant working a lot of nights so I usually stayed with my grandparents. They lived in a small wood-frame house in Robinwood. They didn't have a lot of money but they did have Booberry cereal--which I happily ate right out of the box--and a TV. And every Saturday night was Hee Haw! To me, that was heaven.

Shortly after my mom married my step-dad and settled down again, my grandfather was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and given only six week to live. Maw Maw moved in with us after he passed in November of 1973. She continued to work full time as a dietary aid for St. Vincent's Hospital and help my mom with me and later on my sisters, Melanie & Mia. She had two small back bedrooms that we referred to as "Maw Maw's side" and it was like a little apartment.

One of the rooms, which at one time had been a small kitchen (our house was a converted duplex) was made into her sewing room. She had boxes and boxes of material and fabric scraps that she used to make or paatch a lot of our clothes, blankets and other items. she taught me to do a few things but really didn't have the patience to show me much. she would rather do it for me if I was trying to do something specific. But she didn't mind me playing. Id' sit on her bed for hours fashioning rag dolls, doll clothes and other things while she sat in her recliner cross-stitching, hand sewing, crocheting or reading. I think watching her actually enjoy reading contributed to my love of books as well.

One thing I did not inherit from her (but I developed the ability for it in later years) was gardening. She loved plants and growing things. She had a small garden in our backyard where she grew tomatoes, squash and a few other things. I loved playing in it but was often run out of it for fear I would dig up an actual plant instead of a week or accidentally step on something. She must have sensed my lack of a green thumb!

She also had a flower garden outside her window that she fenced in with that cheap, white wire garden border and decorated elaborately with birdbaths and plastic ducks that I considered my "pets" and actually named! (told you I attached human feelings to inanimate objects!)

Her room was the first in the house to have an air conditioner also so that made hanging out with her all the more appealing! I could lie on her bed for hours in front of that sweet invention and watch TV. We watched Alice, The Jeffersons and just about anything else that came on 42. For some reason, that seemed to be her favorite channel.

When I was a teenager, my room was the one right next to hers and oh how I hated that! She could hear and know everything I did or said and that's when our relationship got tricky. I always loved her, no question about that. But her living with us in a lot of ways robbed me of having a "grandmother" that I could go and visit and let enjoy the good side of me like most grandparents get to do with their grandchildren. Instead, I had a third parent in the house with me, always up in my business, always telling me what to do and I resented it.

Yet, if not for her, I wouldn't have got to do a lot of the things I did or have a lot of the things that I had. She enjoyed having financial freedom for the first time in her life and instead of spending money on herself, she lavished it on her children and grandchildren. I had designer clothes, she paid for most of my band/majorette uniforms (or she made them) and I know she helped my parents out a lot when they were having a tough time. I tried to appreciate it all then...I really did. But I was a selfish teenager, what can I say? I do, however, VERY MUCH appreciate it now.

She loved to go places with us, too and felt left out when we didnt' take her along, even when it was some place she didn't particularly care for. But as the years went on, the relationship between her and my dad became strained for many reasons and I know he didn't mean to but his resentment poured out of him. My dad is a good man but because of things that happened to him in his childhood and the way he was raised, he isn't good at showing love most of the time. He will kiss, hug and love on anyone--and he never meets a stranger. But even though he's very strong in affection, communication he is very lacking.

After I married and moved out, a few years later, subsidized housing called and informed her that her name had finally come to the top of the list for an apartment just down the street. I can still remember her face--she was VERY excited especially when she found out how low the rent was going to be. She was excited to get her own place, finally--at the age of 62! Plans were immediately made to help her get setup and the day she moved out was a hustle and bustle of activity. She seemed so happy yet it didn't take long for her to start feeling lonely in her new place. I know that feeling well--I remember feeling that way when I spent my first night alone in our new apartment. It signifies that a new chapter in your life is beginning and that others are coming to a close and even though it's exciting, it's sad at the same time. That very night it hit her, too and she called my mom, crying and wanting to come back. It wasn't pretty. We all later decided that all the unmarried granddaughters (all but me!) would take turns spending the night with her until she got used to the place and it didn't take her long. She came to enjoy her privacy and being able to retreat to it whenever she wanted to.

When Dylan and Kayti were born she was the proudest great-grandma I have ever seen (she passed away before Brooke was born). She had always been partial to girls but I have never seen a little boy be so loved as the way Dylan was when he was with her. At times I thought I caught glimpses of myself in him when he smiled at her when they would do the things she and I used to do. I know she was thrilled when Kayti came along and she had another little girl to make dresses and hairbows for (even though she never got to see Kayti get any hair to put the bows in!) She could get Kayti to sleep so easily just by holding her in a forward facing position and rocking. Kayti never knew she was being tricked into going to sleep. One of the most precious pictures I have is of the two of them sleeping on the couch together.

By this time, her illness and a hard-lived life was taking its toll on her. My God, I wish we had known then how precious little time we had left. I'm not going into the details of her death because so much of it is still so painful and makes me angry at how the doctors and healthcare people handled things. I will just say it happened so much faster than we expected it to or that it should have and for a long time (and maybe still) my mom blames God. I don't understand it either but I have to believe that He saved her from a lot of suffering because I heard her say more than a few times how she did not want to be in any pain or be a burden to any of us. How that precious woman could have thought she could be a burden to anyone is beyond me...but she has to be happy knowing that she wasn't a burden at all in the way she thought she might be and she wasn't in much pain. She was surrounded by family and went just the way she wanted to go.

That is the worst pain I have ever known or ever hope to know and there isn't a day that goes by that something doesn't remind me of her. I am so grateful to her for so many things. I still miss her terribly. I used to be upset that she didnt' get to see Brooke (or Ryan, Drew, & Mason) but I do believe that she gave us Brooke.

After I announced that I was having "another" baby (right on the heels of Kayti, age 13 months, just a few months after Maw Maw died and it was NOT planned. In fact, I wasn't supposed to be able to have anymore kids but that's another story!) my mom asked me if I knew when I got pregnant. I told her that I felt sure it was one particular night while we were at the beach so we looked at the calendar and found the exact date. She then told me that the night before she'd had a dream about Maw Maw and in the dream my mom was crying and wanting to go be with Maw Maw but Maw Maw told her that she couldn't--she had something else that she needed to do!

I believe Maw Maw knew I was going to have Brooke and that it was her way of letting us all know that she was okay and happy and that we needed to keep on living because that's what SHE wanted to do and would have done if only she could have. And Brooke is SO MUCH like her! She even looks like Maw Maw did at her age and when she was very little, she was always happy and content, no matter what her situation was--just like Maw Maw.

I'd give anything to have just one day back with her. But I know I'll see her again.