Photoessay #425 - Grandma

Time to round up Melina. Called Saphooey, Melina is mostly living with the grandparents now. She had said she wanted to 'go to the beach'. So I inform Dennis, we are going to go to the beach. So much easier if Naomi comes. She tries to slide on us but she goes. Dennis wants to go to Mukilteo, I kind of like Edmonds. But no big deal, we'll go to Mukilteo though it is farther. So I buy some kind of fancy picnic stuff, get a bedspread and towels and off we go. We stop at the Boeing flight museum and Boeing Plant tour. We check it out, proceed to the beach which works fine, we stay a few hours, get ice cream at the EXTREMELY authentic (read run-down) icecream shop. We ask Melina if she would like to take the Boeing tour, she says "yes" so that's our next trip. I had printed out some pictures from the last few outings (ferry trip to visit Grandma Ann, seder). I knew she liked pictures. Almost forgot about them, when we got back to her house, I got them and showed them to her. Asked if she wanted them, she said "yes" so I gave them to her. It was my intention to give them to her, that's why I printed them.

But there was something that I felt when I gave her those pictures, hard to say but it felt like a grandmother giving something to a a grandaughter. It was nothing special, just some pictures I printed out for her. But it was something that I felt. Something different.

Since we're telling stories. My mother tells a story about herself and her grandmother, Delia. Remember this family was quite wealthy and then they were poor. They would visit the grandparents and maybe Delia went to bed early or was bed bound? Anyway, last thing, Delia always wanted to see Claire (my mother, the baby). She would go in and Delia would reach under the pillow and pull out something wrapped in tissue. "Here" she said "You take this". It was usually a valuable piece of jewelry. My grandmother would say "well, what did she give you this time?" The gold beads? The diamond pin?

So I'm starting to get this. I think it's one of those stations in life, you don't truly get it until you're there.

Picture taken in a mirror of Melina and myself. At the Boeing Store. You didn't know there was a Boeing Store? Where they sell all kinds of clothing, models and souvenirs with the logo of the that Chicago-based aircraft company