Girl

My grandmother (who we all called Girl) died this morning.  She was 94.  She fell and broke her hip three days after Elliott was born and had been in the hospital/rehab/an adult care home since December 19th.  She was miserable...miserable that she wasn't at home and miserable that she had lost all of her independence.  Until that day she had lived on her own and was still driving (in a very limited capacity).

Girl's mother died when she was 10 and her father died when she was 13.  There were 7 kids (5 boys and 2 girls) and after their parents died they raised themselves/each other.  She outlived all 6 of her siblings.  I like to think that there is a huge celebration in heaven today with that family reunited.

And of course, she is back together with my grandfather.  I hope there is dancing.

I am glad that she is no longer in pain and miserable, but damn am I going to miss her. She had two sons and I was her only granddaughter and I like to think we had an extra special bond. I'm fairly certain that she bought 99% of my clothing from ages 12 to 20. We had so much fun on our frequent shopping trips.

She also paid for a big chunk of my graduate schooling and my second round of braces. And Spencer already has a pretty decent college fund because of her.

Spencer is old enough to remember Girl.  I think that as long as we keep talking about her he will even remember specific memories.  What I am most sad about, right now,  is that Elliott will never know her.  He "met" her twice and she got to hold him once.  I am so glad we made the effort, amongst all his health problems, to get to Tucson to do that.

I'm also really glad that I pushed and pushed and pushed to get these 4 generation pictures taken in 2010.

We love you Girl.

We will miss you.

I hope there is Polish dancing and Polish food in heaven.

You should wait a little while before you come back to haunt my dad and push him off of bar stools like you always said you would.