A tribute to Betty

I will always cherish the many memories I have with my grandma.

Showing up as a kid to her house to find the same toys in the same box to play with during our visit.

Elastic band bundles full of same coloured pencil crayons that grandpa collected from the schools that he worked at.

Grandma sneaking a toonie to me behind her back so no one else could see, making me believe I was the only one.

The routine check of my nails to make sure they were clean and my cuticles were pushed back and sometimes an extra buck if all my moons were showing.

Week long summer vacations, delivering the mail from the truck, drinking warm milk before bed and walks to the store to buy treats.

Life at grandmas house was simple and wholesome.

As I got older our relationship evolved and we became friends and talked more about life. I always knew there was room around her table whether it was to laugh, eat, sip tea or just talk.

She has always been a constant in my life and I promised to always be a constant in hers.

The last few years life got tough for her. And slowly I was losing someone I had always known and getting to know and love someone who was taking her place. She still had her Betty moments which would make me smile and laugh. She could be downright spicy at times. Dementia was hard for her and for us. We had to learn to talk more about things over people. We’d watched videos of migrating butterflies and sometimes when I was brave I’d let her critique my artwork. We would talk about flowers and trees and places (mostly England), we would FaceTime people, take filtered pictures on snap chat, sip tea, eat butter tarts or some fresh hot french fries.

Somethings never changed: she always loved having her hair done and showing it off, she loved her sweets, a hot cup of tea, McDonald’s French fries, a good book, and most of all her family. AND she really disliked sandals and seeing people’s feet.

Grandma taught me that eating from her fresh garden was the best, homemade soups can be made from anything you have laying around, her freezer could hold gallons of homemade applesauce and gifts for her had 3 rules…if you can’t eat it, read it or throw it away…she really didn’t want it.

I am thankful to be able to carry on some of her traditions with my own grandchildren and can only hope that they find joy in some of the things I did spending time with my grandma.

Once I was seven years old….

If I could go back and relive a bit of my childhood…

I’d take more in. I’d pause, breathe, laugh and smile more. I’d spend more time listening, watching and learning from the people around me. 

And what I would give….

to pretend to fall asleep on the couch one more time so that my mom or dad would carry me into bed and tuck me in with a kiss on the head as I tried to keep my giggles quiet so they wouldn’t know I was really awake.

to have more than a handful of kids in my backyard armed with shovels willing to spend the next 6 hours digging to China. 

to be brave enough to walk barefoot for blocks carrying pails of crayfish home after spending an entire day hunting in the little polluted stream just to show my parents how many we caught so they could drive them back down and let them go. 

to say thank you and I love you. More.

I would be more appreciative. I would be braver. I would take more snapshots of life. I would play harder. Laugh louder. And feel more. 

Once I was seven years old…and it was some of the best most unforgettable moments in my life and I’d love to go back to visit.